San Franciscan songwriter, Ethan Gold, releases "I'll Dance If You'll Dance"

“Waving the flag for quietness” San Franciscan songwriter, Ethan Gold, releases Stranglers-influenced campfire single…

I’LL DANCE IF YOU’LL DANCE

Gently illuminating the margins and spotlighting shyness, Gold releases the latest track from his upcoming album, Earth City 2: Nightfolk

As lead actor, songwriter, and composer for the film, Brother Verses Brother, Gold’s life in music and moving picture expands further this summer

Ethan Gold – I’ll Dance If You Dance

OUT NOW

From the upcoming album Earth City 2: Nightfolk

www.ethangold.com

Chance encounters and a ‘mess of acoustic guitars’ form two links in the DNA chain of I’ll Dance If You Dance, the latest single from Berlin-via-Los Angeles and San Francisco songwriter and documentarian of the outsider class, Ethan Gold – OUT NOW. Renowned for a two-decade career of soundtracks, words and broad artistic exploration, Gold’s latest invitation into an emotive underbelly of shyness and letting loose at the margins is drawn from his upcoming album, Earth City 2: Nightfolk.

The latest in a series of albums linked by their exploration of cracked circumstance and small ‘c’ conservative longing, the unhurried track-by-track reveal of Gold’s first long-player since 2021’s Earth City 1: The Longing, began in late-2024. Recalling classic new-wave pop influences on I’m In The Moon, playing to a picture of mid-century psych on Camera and finding the tension between a drivetime groove and closeted thrills in The Inhibitionists, Gold’s initial, furtive reveal of his newest work in winter bloomed to become an all-out launch in spring.

Since releasing the first of his four Hollywood soundtracks in 2010, Gold’s public life in film has been sustained in convivial co-habitation with music and writing. Following acclaimed US festival screenings of the film, Brother Verses Brother, in which Gold is lead actor, as well as songwriter and composer (directed by his brother, fellow musician, filmmaker and actor, Ari Gold), the artist has preceded TBA solo tour dates with European film festival appearances. Also featuring Weezer’s Brian Bell, the film recently previewed at Munich International Film Festival and Galway Film Fleadh.

Pre-occupied with social miscalculation, the defiant magic of introversion and finding release in places where nobody is looking, I’ll Dance If You Dance was recorded in Nashville in the company of friends and relative strangers. Encountering backing singers, Julia Austin and Lynn Marie in a local café and inviting them ‘on a hunch’ to sing with them, Gold and his engineer/percussionist, Cal Campbell, captured the essence of the nightfolk who reluctantly star on this and every song of the upcoming, 11-track album.

Gold reflects on the single and accompanying video:

“I’ll Dance If You’ll Dance” is another angle on introversion. Shyness is nice. I used acoustic sounds to get the feeling of a camp, where the shy people might dance off in the dark away from the fire. It sounds nothing like The Stranglers’ ‘Feline’ album but conceptually that record was an influence on this song. The cafe flavour, the quiet blend of acoustic instruments and some percussion, real and electronic.

“In the video I am trying to capture that campfire flavour, as well as my rejection of the crass modern world. I had costumes made to reflect what I think beauty should be, outfits that were of any period but looked old school bohemian. With the song and video, I'm waving the flag for quietness, but maybe some form of wild, unhindered quietness.”

Written and recorded between Nashville, Glasgow and rural Scotland, Earth City 2: Nightfolk is set for future release on multiple formats. Described by Gold as an album of “nervous, romantic anthems, moody journeys of loss, and stories of the introverts stepping from their shells in the night across the globe.” It’s release bridges Earth City 1: The Longing and the, as yet unannounced, Earth City 3 as the second in a promised trilogy.