REMEMBER THE OXYGEN EP SET FOR RELEASE NOVEMBER 5TH
Photo by Whitney Wilson & Hannah LaJoye Photography
LISTEN: “BREATHING”
Boston-based singer/songwriter Spencer LaJoye has released “Breathing,” the new single from their forthcoming EP Remember The Oxygen, set for release on November 5th. "'Breathing' is the story of me learning to breathe my own air again, so to speak," LaJoye explains. "When I remembered to breathe my own oxygen rather than meeting and anticipating everyone else’s needs first, I learned a lot of things (for one: I am not a girl. Oops!). It’s the story of me grabbing my own oxygen mask. I first wrote this song as part of a home-recorded concept album for a Netflix show, The Haunting of Bly Manor. I took on the project during quarantine, simply as a matter of fun, and the whole thing felt like a breath of fresh air," they continue. "This song told me a truth about myself before I even knew it was true. Once I realized that this song I wrote for this just-for-fun concept album was actually about my truest self, I knew it had to be on this first EP under my new truest name."
“Breathing” follows the release of powerful lead single “House Fires.” "Reclaiming myself as a nonbinary person was about so much more than gender.,” LaJoye explains of the song. “To summon up the resolve to say 'these boxes aren’t for me,' I also had to say, 'these relationships aren’t for me, these systems aren’t for me, this people-pleasing disposition is not for me.' Ultimately, on the other side of all of that going up in flames, I found clarity and peace...and I’m still settling into who I am." "House Fires" is the story of deciding what parts of ourselves and our lives we hold onto when everything else burns.
LISTEN: “HOUSE FIRES”
Spencer LaJoye’s music feels like taking a long walk on cracked pavement. Their dynamic acoustic tones and layered vocals are reminiscent of melancholic sixties folk songs - but their genre-bending doesn’t end there. Resonant vocal loops spin these classic sounds into delightfully boppy pop songs that are both mesmerizing and haunting with their detailed, autobiographical lyrics.
Out of Boston, Massachusetts, LaJoye is a folk/pop singer-songwriter, violinist, and vocal loop artist who has garnered a growing fan base around the world through live performances, live streams, and an ever-increasing loyal Patreon community. Charming, humorous, and acutely self-aware, their live performances leave audiences crying, laughing, and wanting more.
One of eight in a family of musicians in rural Southwest Michigan, LaJoye picked up a violin at the age of five, and pursued classical music until college, when they swapped their bow for a pen. They wrote their first EP as a closeted queer kid in a historically conservative Christian college while pursuing a degree in theology. Their songwriting and theologizing became tools of self-empowerment amid a culture of shame. Now an outspoken nonbinary bisexual, LaJoye’s goal is to foster a life-affirming community through music, and to “bring people to church” at their shows.
Their first EP We’ve Been That Way Before won the WYCE Jammie Award for Listener’s Choice in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and most recently, LaJoye was chosen as a winner of the 2021 Kerrville New Folk Songwriting Competition.
This fall, LaJoye will release their new four-track EP, Remember The Oxygen, written before, during, and following their coming out as trans/gender non-binary. The songs document them becoming themselves, a journey that involved just as much looking to the past as it did moving towards the future. “As it turns out, I knew who I was from the very beginning,” says LaJoye. “I knew how to breathe all along. To re-becoming myself. I just had to let some things burn, let some things hurt, and finally, remember my own oxygen.”