Paul Kelly announced his 29th studio album ‘Fever Longing Still’ will be released on 1 November 2024
‘Houndstooth Dress’ is the third and final single to be released ahead of the album
Paul talks ‘Houndstooth Dress’: “There have been many songs over the years based on accessories and apparel – Raspberry Beret, Blue Jean Baby, These Boots Are Made for Walking, Famous Blue Raincoat, Leopard Skin Pillbox Hat, Dirty Jeans, Short Skirt/Long Jacket and a whole lot more. My old song Winter Coat belongs to this venerable genre. I think of Houndstooth Dress as the latest in this long line. I wrote it just before going into the studio so threw it to the band without having had a chance to rehearse. Commandeered the piano and taught it to them on the go. Only two chords. In a minor key but not a minor feeling. We got it on the first take as you can hear from the chat at the start.”
‘Houndstooth Dress’ follows first single ‘Taught By Experts’ – a song which Kelly originally recorded as blue grass on his 1999 album ‘Smoke’ with Uncle Bill and now recorded with full band, seamlessly fitting into Paul Kelly’s timeless cannon of classics. And ‘Going To The River With Dad’, a song inspired by the opening essay of Noel Pearson’s book ‘Mission’.
Paul Kelly’s last album was his celebration of all things Christmas with ‘Paul Kelly’s Christmas Train’, a #1 ARIA Album. His last album of new material was 2018’s ARIA Award winning and #1 album ‘Nature’
‘Fever Longing Still’, a phrase taken from Shakespeare’s Sonnet 147, has a clear theme running through each song. Love. Kelly explains: “For close to fifty years I’ve written mostly love songs. I never know what I’m doing until I’m in the middle of it but, looking back, it seems this record is an attempt to present all those kinds of love songs into one forty minute album. Urgent love, patient love, happy love, sad love, deluded love, clear-eyed love, complicated love, the beginning of love, the end of love; love gone wrong, love pretty right, love of clan, love between parents and children, love of oblivion, love of pain, love of revenge.”