With his four acclaimed solo albums and myriad records of various collaboration, Kevin Morby has become a true musical auteur. Each record possesses its own unique persona and explores intriguing themes and fertile terrain through shifting, focused textures and dexterous, dedicated skill. And now, with the lavish, resplendent, career-best double LP Oh My God (out today via Dead Oceans), Morby delivers a grandiose director’s cut of his biggest statement to date, epic in scope as well as sound.
Throughout his past work, Morby has noticed the ubiquity of an apparent religious theme. Though not identifying as “religious” in the slightest, Morby recognizes in himself a somewhat spiritual being with a secular attitude towards the soulful. And so, in an effort to tackle that notion head-on and once-and-for-all, he sat down in his form of church—on planes and in beds—and wrote what would become his first true concept-album. If Singing Saw was Morby’s LA record, and City Music was his ode to New York City, then Oh My God lives in the sky, above the weather, both nowhere and everywhere at once.
“Religion is around all of us,” Morby says. “It’s a universal language and there is profound beauty in it. I’ve found it a useful tool within songwriting, as it’s something everyone can relate to on some level. There are religious themes or imagery in a lot of what I’ve done, so I wanted to get all of that out and speak only that language for a whole record. It’s not a born-again thing; it’s more that ‘oh my god’ is such a profound statement we all use multiple times a day and means so many different things. It’s not about an actual god but a perceived one, and it’s an outsider’s view of the human experience in terms of religion.”
In 2016, on the heels of a trio of critically-acclaimed albums, he wrote the protest song “Beautiful Strangers” about the devastating world events of that year, and in it he inserted multiple “oh my god”s as pleas of desperation. The song became his most celebrated work to date and the phrase became a mantra for Morby, inspiring him to weave the exclamation conceptually into the fabric of an entire album. In effect, he sought to highlight how that immortal turn of phrase embodies so much of our relationship with the sacred and profane—how religion is all around us, always, and that by simply uttering an OMG we enforce its ubiquity and ability to endure while humanizing its reach.
“This one feels full circle, my most realized record yet,” he says. “It’s a cohesive piece; all the songs fit under the umbrella of this religious theme. I was able to write and record the album I wanted to make. It’s one of those marks of a life: this is why I slept on floors for seven years. I’ve now gotten the keys to my own little kingdom, and I’m devoting so much of my life to music that I just want to keep it interesting. At the end of the day, the only thing I don’t want is to be bored. If someone wants to get in my face about writing a non-religious religious record? Thank god. That’s all I gotta say.”
Kevin Morby Tour Dates
Wed. May 8, 2019 – Los Angeles, CA @ The Theatre at Ace Hotel *
Fri. May 10, 2019 – Santa Cruz, CA @ The Catalyst (Live in the Atrium) *
Sat. May 11, 2019 – San Francisco, CA @ The Fillmore *
Mon. May 13, 2019 – Portland, OR @ Crystal Ballroom *
Tue. May 14, 2019 – Seattle, WA @ The Showbox *
Wed. May 15, 2019 – Vancouver, BC @ Imperial Vancouver *
Fri. May 17, 2019 – Salt Lake City, UT @ The State Room *
Sat. May 18, 2019 – Denver, CO @ Bluebird Theater *
Fri. May 31, 2019 – New York, NY @ Town Hall *
Sat. June 1, 2019 – Washington, DC @ 9:30 Club *
Sun. June 2, 2019 – Philadelphia, PA @ Union Transfer *
Mon. June 3, 2019 – Boston, MA @ The Sinclair *
Wed. June 5, 2019 – Toronto, ON @ The Opera House *
Thu. June 6, 2019 – Ann Arbor, MI @ The Ark *
Fri. June 7, 2019 – Chicago, IL @ Thalia Hall *
Sat. June 8, 2019 – Chicago, IL @ Thalia Hall *
Fri. June 14 – Brussels, BE @ AB *
Sat. June 15 – Berlin, DE @ Festsaal Kreuzberg *
Sun. June 16 – Mannheim, DE @ Maifield Derby *
Mon. June 17 – Amsterdam, NL @ Paradiso *
Wed. June 19 – London, UK @ O2 Sheperds Bush Empire *
Thu. June 20 – Paris, FR @ Le Cabaret Sauvage *
Sat. June 22 – Hamburg, DE @ Knust *
Sun. June 23 – Copenhagen, DK @ Vega *
Mon. June 24 – Aarhus, DK @ Voxhall *
Wed. June 26 – Helsinki, FI @ Tavastia *
Fri. Jun 28, 2019 – Stockholm, Sweden @ Debaser/Bar Brooklyn (solo)
Sat. Jun 29, 2019 – Gothenburg, Sweden @ Pustervik (solo)
Sun. Jun 30, 2019 – Oslo, Norway @ John Dee (solo)
Mon. Jul 1, 2019 – Tromsø, Norway @ Blårock Café (solo)
Tue. Jul 2, 2019 – Bergen, Norway @ Landmark (solo)
Wed Jul 3, 2019 – Malmö, Sweden @ Babel (solo)
Fri. Jul 5, 2019 – Vilanova i la Geltrú, Spain @ Vida Festival (solo)
Sat. Jul 6, 2019 – Madrid, Spain @ Copérnico (solo)
Sun. Jul 7, 2019 – Lisbon, Portugal @ São Luiz Teatro Municipal (solo)
Mon. Jul 8, 2019 – Braga, Portugal @ Gnration (solo)
Wed. Jul 10, 2019 – Biarritz, France @ La Côte des Basques (solo)
Thu. Jul 11, 2019 – Bordeaux, France @ Rock School Barbey (solo)
Fri. Jul 12, 2019 – Toulouse, France @ Le Théatre de Garonne (solo)
Sun. Jul 14, 2019 – Roubaix, France @ La Cave aux Poetes (solo)
Wed. Jul 17, 2019 – Istanbul, Turkey @ IKSV (solo)
Fri. Jul 19, 2019 – Dublin, Ireland @ The Grand Social (solo)
* w/ Sam Cohen