Golden Suits is a new project from Department of Eagles Fred Nicolaus.
This is Nicolaus’ first album recorded on his own – although he wrote or co-wrote many of Department Of Eagles’ best-known songs (including ‘No One Does It Like You’) – and is a mix of meticulously crafted, ever-so-slightly left of center pop songs. Written and recorded over two years, Nicolaus played almost all instruments on Golden Suits himself, calling upon help where needed from friends.
The first tune for public consumption is the soaring, seesawing song ‘Didn’t I Warn You’
The ten songs on Golden Suits sprang from one long, strange year in Nicolaus’ life in which he went through a breakup, was displaced from his Brooklyn apartment by a rat infestation, traveled to Germany to learn about his grandfather’s death in WWII, went broke, and lost forty pounds. The work of his favorite writer John Cheever became a particular salve throughout this time, an influence that permeates each track through a blend of straight details mixed with the surreal. The resulting album is sincere, direct, and honest, combining skewed references to one book about 1950s suburban marriage (the band name even pulled from the final line of one story) with nostalgia, sentimentality, and personal confessions.
Golden Suits track listing:
1 Swimming In ‘99
2 Under Your Wing
3 I Think You Would Have Been Mine
4 You Can’t Make Your Mind Up
5 Restaurant Song
6 Didn’t I Warn You
7 Wash It Away
8 Find A Way
9 Little One
10 Dearly Beloved
Released 19/8 on Yep Roc
