Birdie Busch - If You Swim Far Enough (2019)

A release of an early collaborative recording with sound engineer Rachel Alina in pairing with Alina’s new Chapbook release of poetry entitled Locals. Locals foregrounds the characters who shape subjectivity, a bildungsroman built in reverse, from the periphery in. Alina, born and raised in Ocean City, New Jersey, takes the reader on a rambling journey down the boardwalks and bleached-out side streets of her south shore hometown, beginning and ending at its musical secret, Scullville Studios, managed by Jerry Klause and on property owned by Herb “Bubba Mac” Birch.Jerry and Bubba; Lee, Ivan, Tucker, and Shelly — no matter the town, this industry is run by the men who hang around — the townies, the locals. With caution, they let Alina into their inner circle and teach her to mix records. Many storied musicians pass through Scullville’s doors — Levon Helm refers to her as “the only one/who knows/how to mix/at Bubba’s” — and Alina becomes a part of its fabric, but always at a remove. She is often reduced to and referenced as “that girl.” Yet Alina’s framing is never jaded; it is fond and empathetic and kind. The locals are all people, navigating the breakwaters together. Birdie Busch’s arrival at Scullville marks a turning point for Alina, as the two build a lasting and intimate friendship, solidified in a one-room, one-take experimental demo that serves as the tonal complement to Locals. Female friendships sustain and lift, an emotional undercurrent that Locals celebrates quietly. For record label Style Upon Styles, Alina’s work presents itself as an opportunity not only to demarcate an important time in music history and to support the multidimensionality of an artist who has been integral to the label — Alina has mastered and mixed the majority of Styles’s releases over the past three years, including the most recent King Garbage, Rosehardt, and Gabriel Garzon-Montano records — but also to fashion a counternarrative of the women artists so often relegated to the edges. In this vein, Styles has commissioned Ashley Smestad Vélez, an art director for legacy print media and a recurring Styles collaborator, to create a series of hand-drawn, companion illustrations for Locals, an opportunity for Vélez to re-engage with her own artistic practice.In Locals, Alina sees each character and artist in their entirety, clearly and compassionately, and builds a collaborative work that projects her vision into one for the industry at large. Every copy of the book comes with a free download of the EP IF you Swim Far Enough.