Guiding Hand by ford.

The album title, ‘Guiding Hand,’ is a tribute to the people in our lives who give us momentum and push us forward. For Luc, that force is intangibly linked to his older brother Parker who passed away in a swimming accident when Luc was 7. Parker had just arrived at college that summer and was in a water activity where a classmate of his got pinned in a hidden whirlpool under a bridge. Parker ended up diving in twice in an effort to rescue that friend. While he was able to save that student’s life, Parker was knocked unconscious underwater and fell into a coma which he never came out of.

The hands seen on the cover of this record are plaster casts of his Mom and Parker's joined hands, which his parents had made in the mortuary during the week between his passing and burial. He's one of the main reasons Luc began writing music in the first place, and remains a constant guiding force throughout his life.

“I feel so lucky to have had an older brother that exposed me to so much great music as a kid. Whether it was hearing him on his Yamaha DTxpress drum set a couple of rooms over or walking around during Fête de la musique and watching him play his djembe, he had such a real, innate love for music and always found ways to share it with others. I spent a lot of time thinking back on those years throughout the process of writing this record.”

Recording for 'Guiding Hand' began in late 2020, isolated within the mountains and valleys of Utah. The project came together slowly over the following months, with the bulk of the creation happening late into the night, a time when Luc feels most in tune with making music.

Sonically, ‘Guiding Hand’ is an innovative electronic record with a strong emotional resonance. Pulling from musical inspirations such as Caribou, Jai Paul, J Dilla, Toro y Moi, and Jamie XX, ford. weaves electronic, hip hop, indie, jazz, and lo-fi production utilizing intricate live drums, textured strings, modular synths, crate-dug samples, and shoe-gaze vocals from the acclaimed A Beacon School on the track ‘In Motion’. Stylistically, the music clearly cuts through as ford.’s most detailed work to date while still maintaining his familiar sound of big warm chords and emotive undertones.

“I really just wanted to be more intentional with the music this time around. A lot of it was me trying to get back to the idea of conveying emotion through just the music alone (hence the one feature) and being a little more purposeful and aware of where I was pulling inspiration from. It’s a cliché but I do think there is a lot of value in letting the music speak for itself and letting people connect to it in whatever way makes the most sense to them.”

Over two years in the making, ‘Guiding Hand’ cements a major chapter in ford.’s creative journey – a time of growth, maturity, and reflection of who he is and the influences that guide him forward. The new album ‘Guiding Hand’ officially arrives on August 11th.

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mgmt ― kylekusanagi.mgmt@gmail.com

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