The Los Angeles-based singer-songwriter Maxim Ludwig has collaborated with Angel Olsen for the new single ‘Mercury Avenue’. Along with Ludwig’s band The Mystics – Matt Bernstein on bass and guitar and Jorge Balbi on drums – the track features Olsen on harmonies and synthesizer, Jonathan Wilson on synthesizer, and Sean O’Brien on organ and guitar. Olsen also co-directed the accompanying video with Angela Ricciardi. Check it out below.
“It’s about not going toward darkness, being brought back to life and living through love,” Ludwig said in a statement about the song, adding of the video: “The archetype of ‘The Man Out of Place’ in films has always been something I’ve gravitated towards: Jack Nicholson on foot through the Sahara in ‘The Passenger,’ Elliott Gould walking on the beach in ‘The Long Goodbye,’ Albert Finney wearing a tuxedo on the Day of the Dead in ‘Under the Volcano,’ Harry Dean Stanton in ‘Paris, Texas.’ These images are like romantic period paintings of modernity; the characters are simultaneously bewildered and accepting of their predicament.”
Ludwig is set to embark on a tour with Olsen this September, playing shows in California, New York, and New Jersey. The pair recently covered Lou Reed’s ‘I Can’t Stand It’ for The Power of the Heart: A Tribute to Lou Reed.
