Addy Edward Photo
single cover
“Crawling into bed / a busy head / Later that it gets / the more I stress / Anxious now to sleep / the cycle creeps / on and on and on / right through the dawn.”
So begins “Too Hungry to Eat,” the latest single from New Haven-based multi-instrumentalist Addy Edward, a meditation on pent-up frustrations and the anxiety of an emptiness that cannot be filled, themes that have become more common than not as the world continues to find a balance between safety and searching for a way to keep themselves occupied and entertained. For Edward — full name Adam Bensen — this included developing a new approach to his music.
“My process for planning releases is I don’t have one,” said Edward with a laugh. “I work on a song for years, then get sick of it, then pull it out a year later. I’m so disorganized. I’m trying to break that pattern.”
Edward began 2020 with the EP Sedative Answers; he put on a show to promote it last January at Best Video. He was to return to that space in March as part of daniprobably, the band he is in with Danielle Capalbo, when Covid-19 related cancellations began.
“We were texting each other, ‘should we do it?’ It was like we all got hit by a bus. We were unsure, and then it got cancelled,” he said. After a month or two without shows, he joined the many who were trying out livestreams.
“I did one or two,” he said, noting that he has always looked for inspiration in the performance aspect of his art. “If I’m not producing or rehearsing for a performance I’m not writing too much,” he said. “It’s helpful to keep me in my music room playing, exploring, writing, and turning it into a recording.”
Addy Edward
In an effort to keep at it and not be discouraged by the lack of live music performances, Edward ended up compiling songs he had around. He released the single “Daybreak Eyes” in April, having written it a couple of months before the pandemic.
“My outlet was recording,” he said. He then began “chipping away” at a few other songs, and ended up recording the EP Playing Dead, which he then released in September, five songs that were a combination of both old and new material.
“The third song [“Sugar and Fill”] was from 2017,” said Edward. “I had recorded a demo, and then over quarantine I beefed it out, all pretty piecemeal. The fourth track [“Moving Blinds”] I wrote in quarantine, and the last track [“Easy Lift”] I tacked on the week before. Often I don’t have a big picture, but I find a way,” he added. But after that EP he decided to change his approach.
“I think it’s better going the singles route, not getting overwhelmed with details, to ride the momentum and energy of a single. Especially in these times right now I can wake up overwhelmed. What should be fun, I can make overwhelming. If I take too big a bite it gets discouraging.” He would rather “make sure I can still enjoy the process, pare down what I’m looking at.”
Edward has been playing music since the age of eight. Born and raised in Shelton, he began on the drums, and then ended up “cutting my teeth” playing music in church — adding bass, guitar and vocals to his repertoire — throughout high school. He switched to playing “cover songs at college nights” after that, and then for six years did not play any music live, though he kept writing and recording.
“In college I recorded at home a lot,” he said. “I probably have 100-plus songs from college and in my mid-late twenties days.” He was thrilled to get back into performing live where he felt he could focus on perfecting his sound.
“Live performances and the prep for those is where you hone a song … the rise and fall, where you kick and where you chill out.” Without live shows, he said, “that process is taken away to share and get feedback.”
Another outlet for his creativity and process is with the band daniprobably, with whom he has been playing since 2018.
“Dani integrated me into the New Haven scene,” Edward said. He sang and played drums and bass with the band, but has “changed gears” during the pandemic. Now he is using a drum machine, playing bass and guitar, and is “leaning more in a pop direction” while working on a new single for the band.
“I’m taking what I’m learning with guitar and bass with Addy Edward and applying it to daniprobably,” he said, hoping to emphasize the “strong hooks” in these new “smart pop gems” that Dani has written.
The band released the EP Fishing in October 2020, though it had been recorded back in 2018, and also released the single “Fall Back” in November on Spotify. It is now also available on Bandcamp and Edward is “so proud of it. It’s a killer song.”
The band did a livestreamed show at The District in the fall, which was “the set we would have done at Best Video back in March,” according to Edward.
He continues to use his looping method for both projects, band and solo. “I always wanted my live performance as big as I want it to be. The looper and drum machine allow it,” he said.
Karen Ponzio Photo
Edward performing at Best Video in January 2020
Edward got his first loop pedal in 2019, which was when he began playing solo live again and “it died from overuse,” he said. He upgraded to a two-channel, two-track looper, which he said also ”aids in my writing and helps me lay down a progression.”
“I want to be able to layer up sounds with just one person playing. My goal is always to amp up the sound,” he said. To that end, he is still using a pedal board, though before he was looping the rhythm on guitar, he now has the drum machine synched up with it to provide that rhythm. This aligns with Edward’s practice of doing all of his own recording, producing, and engineering, which he said he has done his whole life using “my Macbook and interfaces and a couple of other things.”
Though he is always trying to get better and have a good time in the process. “It’s a lot of fun taking the DIY thing to the max,” he said. “I’m having a blast. There’s nothing holding you back from making what you want to make. Something might organically crystallize over time, so you take it as it comes, and find or create a reason to start rehearsing again.”
This is exactly how Edward came to his newest single. Invited in October 2020 by Little Sluggers drummer Dan Deutsch to do an outdoor performance for an art gallery opening, he needed an hour and a half of music and ended up writing “Too Hungry to Eat,” which premiered on Bandcamp on Dec. 31 and will be “everywhere” on Jan. 15.
“I’m working on being a better planner,” he said. “I want to get a few more ears on it. It’s the most planning I’ve ever done for a release in my life.”
Edward also hopes to “create some reasons to prepare. My short-term plan is to find reasons to play: to stumble across a song, record it, and put it out there,” he said, hoping to move beyond some of those feelings of self-induced artistic stress and, not unlike his own music aptly does, create a more meditative state of being.
“It’s nice and freeing to be in this space,” he said.
“Too Hungry to Eat” is now available on Bandcamp and will be available on Spotify and all streaming services on Jan. 15.
