There are late-bloomers—and then there’s Eilir Pierce. After more than 30 years, 39 self-released albums and upward of 500 songs, the Welsh outsider has finally gotten around to releasing his first official standalone single. “Do-List” is an early sample of Pierce’s 40th album, Half-Time, basically a synth-pop musical about moving to a new city and attempting a middle-age career renaissance. For Pierce, that has entailed relocating from Wales to Glasgow, Scotland.
Available October 23, Half-Time features appearances from Arab Strap’s Aidan Moffat and Mercury Prize-nominated Welsh artist Gwenno. The album—which has evolved into a stage production Pierce is bringing to Edinburgh Festival Fringe in August—represents something of a reset for an artist who’s spent decades largely ignoring the music industry’s typical parameters. Back in 2008, Degawdawns, a 100-track Pierce retrospective, earned kudos from none other than Pulp’s Jarvis Cocker.
Two decades later, Pierce is now making a run at pop stardom—or at least his version of it. “Do-List” offers a pretty good indication of where his head is at. Built around tense piano runs and a frazzled vocal, the song barrels through tasks, ambitions and unfinished business.
“It may not be the most immediately accessible song on Half-Time, but it felt like the right introduction because it represents something fundamental about me: my ADHD, my obsessive list-making and the way procrastination can turn even ordinary responsibilities into something enormous and frightening,” says Pierce. “My sister died recently, and I remember her also struggling with procrastination when we were teenagers. That’s given the song another meaning for me, and I’m now dedicating it to her.”
Pierce wanted the video for “Do List” to feel deliberately simple and direct. “It’s inspired by those early-’70s performance videos where an artist was placed in a brightly lit white studio with almost nothing to hide behind,” he says of the clip, which was shot cinematographer Carlo D’Alessandro. “David Bowie’s ‘Life On Mars?’ was one reference—that stark, overexposed space where the performer, the song and the camera have to hold your attention.”
We’re proud to premiere Eilir Pierce’s “Do-List.”
—Hobart Rowland
