Naia Izumi – multi-instrumentalist and multi-talented champion of a formidable style of math rock-meets-R&B – has announced his debut full-length album A Residency In The Los Angeles Area, which will be released on July 30 via Sony Music Masterworks.
Alongside the news, the singer-songwriter has also dropped the record’s lead single Voodoo – a masterful three-and-a-half minute demonstration of Izumi’s commanding rhythmic prowess and expert electric guitar abilities.
Armed with a Fender Jazzmaster ‘64 reissue and a Fender Deluxe guitar amp, Izumi serves up a series of ethereal, modulation-drenched chordal constructions, before executing a dizzying array of time-signature-shifting arpeggiated melodies that are effortlessly layered underneath his soulful vocals.
“Voodoo just came out. It’s definitely a song that flows. It disorients you and might make you fall in love with it at the same time,” Izumi told Guitar World.
“Sometimes, I don’t want to feel lonely, so I’ll write a song to put me in a different place,” he continued. “With Voodoo, I imagined how it would feel if I found the person who fits me so well. It would be disorienting. There’s almost a seductive and enchanting quality to the song. I wanted to replicate the vibe of falling in love.”
Voodoo is Izumi’s first new material since his 2019 single Gravity, which followed up his 2018 NPR Tiny Desk Contest-winning single Soft Spoken.
"I make music I'm not hearing. That was my purpose as a kid," muses Izumi. "I heard pieces of things, but it wasn't what I wanted to hear. I tried to get better and better, so I could make what I was hearing in my head.
"I'm just the average dude who's just trying to do the best he can. I'm learning to control what I want to say with the vibe, the music and the words. If it connects you in some way, I'm a happy person."
Check out the A Residency In The Los Angeles Area tracklist below.
- Honesty
- Natural Disaster
- Six Inch Stilettos
- Voodoo
- Water
- What Happened To Love?
- Good At Being Lonely
- Sad Song
- As It Comes
- Be Still
- Personal Heaven
- Hand In Hand
- Soft Spoken (Sound City Version)
A Residency In The Los Angeles Area is available to preorder now ahead of its July 30 release.
