Basia Bulat is back with news of a new album — Basia's Palace is arriving February 21 on Secret City Records, and today we get a video for lovely lead single "Baby."
"Baby" features strings arranged by Drew Jurecka, and it comes attached to a dreamy one-take video shot on film by director Nora Rosenthal.
In a statement about the song, Bulat said:
I wrote this song many years ago but never could get the lyrics and performance quite right. I wanted to try it again after becoming a parent — it's about how we can't control how or when we're going to evolve even when we desperately want to. We keep making the same mistakes until we notice a pattern repeating, and even then, change is hard when we have to fully surrender to it. Could I make that predicament something I wanted to dance to? Could I sing the lyrics with joy instead of the sorrow I was channelling in the past? Nothing in my life has made me want to evolve faster, better, stronger than parenthood and the universe keeps throwing that desire back at me with a laugh and a wink, reminding me that things take time and to just love myself for being human. So this song from my past I couldn't let go of finally made it onto a record — after all the times I tried to get it right I knew I finally had 'the take' when my daughter kept asking to hear it again.
Basia's Palace takes place in Bulat's "apartment, her jam-space, and the inside of her head. It is a place festooned with love and memory, and bad wiring; it's a paradise that comes alive in the wee hours of the night–a time that's suited to video games and Leonard Cohen records, when you sit in all that richness and take in all the mess we inherit."
The album first germinated in 2022, inspired by a new home, a new family, and Leonard Cohen's legendary habit of writing at 3 or 4 a.m. before his kids woke up. The late-night (or early morning) practice helped Bulat find "new ways of understanding all that happened in her life across the years."
Basia's Palace was co-produced by frequent collaborator Mark Lawson and mixed by engineer Tucker Martine. It's the follow-up to 2022's orchestral The Garden, and Bulat will be taking the record on the road with 2025 performances in Toronto, Montreal, Ottawa, Vancouver and more.
Check out the video for "Baby," plus the Basia's Palace tracklist and Bulat's upcoming tour dates below.
Basia's Palace:
1. My Angel
2. Baby
3. Spirit
4. Right Now
5. Disco Polo
6. The Moon
7. Daylight
8. Laughter
9. Curtain Call
Basua Bulat 2024/2025 North American tour:
10/10 McDonald's Corners, ON - Festival of Small Halls (McDonald's Corners Agriculture Hall
10/11 Picton, ON - Base31
10/12 Mississippi Mills, ON - Festival of Small Halls (Almonte Old Town Hall)
02/15 St. Albert, AB - Arden Theatre
02/16 Regina, SK - Darke Hall
03/07 Ottawa, ON - NAC
03/14 Montreal, QC - Théâtre Fairmount
03/15 Sherbrooke, QC - La Petite Boîte Noire
03/19 Boston, MA - City Winery
03/20 New York City, NY - Joe's Pub
03/21 Washington, DC - Pearl Street Warehouse
03/22 Philadelphia, PA - World Cafe Live
03/28 Quebec City, QC - Théâtre Petit Champlain
04/02 Chicago, IL - Old Town School of Folk Music
04/03 Madison, WI - Majestic Theatre
04/04 Minneapolis, MN - Cedar Cultural Center
04/05 Milwaukee, WI - Vivarium
04/30 Vancouver, BC - Hollywood Theatre
05/02 Seattle, WA - Triple Door
05/03 Portland, OR - Mission Theater
05/05 San Francisco, CA - The Chapel
05/07 Los Angeles, CA - The Masonic Lodge at Hollywood Forever
05/22 Toronto, ON – The Great Hall
05/23 London, ON - Aeolian Hall