February 5th, 2022 7pm Stage 2
As of June 16, 2021, New York State has lifted all COVID-19 related restrictions that apply to a venue of Rockwood’s size. In accordance with these revised guidelines, vaccination records will no longer be checked and entry will be permitted for both vaccinated and unvaccinated individuals. Social distancing and masks will not be required, although masks will remain recommended for non-vaccinated individuals.
Amy Jay
Having earned critical applause for her melancholy indie folk, Amy Jay now makes a remarkable leap forward with an evocative and absorbing debut album, Awake Sleeper. With striking candor and unadorned imagery, the Florida-born, NYC-based singer-songwriter surveys profound emotional terrain with a paradoxically lush sonic approach. Exploring the boundaries between acoustic and synthetic, minimalist and ornate, Awake Sleeper echoes a breathtaking cross pollination of deeply personal songcraft, surprising textures, and hypnotic soundscapes.
Recorded at Brooklyn’s Mason Jar Music with producer Jonathan Seale (Feist, Fleet Foxes, Aoife O'Donovan), Awake Sleeper marks Jay’s third official project and first full-length release following a pair of well-received EPs – 2016’s Supposed To Be and 2018’s So It Is – that earned her national acclaim and nearly 1M worldwide streams. The album, sparked by wandering thoughts during Jay’s train commute, sees Jay juggling fragments of emotional memory with detailed scenes of the day-to-day. Her lyrical stream of consciousness reveals imperceptible self-truths, subtly coalescing into something universal through interconnected themes of duality, sensory overload, and spirituality in an increasingly complex world. Songs like “Lucid Dreaming” and the lacerating “Monster” are contemplative and unsettled, not unlike journal entries set to her own internal soundtrack, where mundane recollections morph into heightened sensations and transcendent revelation.
“I want the listener to feel suspended in an outer calm and inner angst,” says Jay. “To go back to formative memories, to relive the sensory experiences that shaped them, and empower them to delve deep and process those emotions head on.”