$Basia Bulat \/ YES Basement, Manchester \/ Thu 19 Jun$

Basia Bulat is a singer-songwriter living in Montreal, Canada. She offers both a distinctive voice and artistry that pulls as much from gospel and soul as it does from classic folk. In addition to her skills as a powerhouse vocalist, Bulat is an accomplished multi-instrumentalist, recording and performing on electric guitar, piano, autoharp, ukulele, bass and charango.
Her new album Basia’s Palace, mixed by Tucker Martine (Beth Orton, Neko Case, The National) and with string arrangements by Grammy-nominated composer Drew Jurecka (Dua Lipa, Metric, Alvvays), is set to be released on 21 February 2025.
Basia’s Palace got its start in 2022. A new home, a new family, a pause: the singer was finally finding time to hear her own thoughts, to think about old stories, to boot up her Nintendo to play Dragon Warrior 4. It brought to mind anecdotes Bulat had heard about Leonard Cohen - how he used to do his best writing at three or four a.m., before his kids woke up, when he’d sit and toy with his Casio’s presets. Now it was Bulat sneaking down to play RPGs or to make music on her MacBook, listening for the spirit-world at a time when the veil felt thinnest. The songs she was creating didn’t feel like anything she had recorded before - MIDI soundscapes that floated and gleamed, like hidden levels above (or below) the action.
The album that emerged from all this - that started in dawn-kissed synth instrumentals, lyrics scribbled down in a Hayao Miyazaki notebook - is the softest and most searching of her career. Basia’s Palace is like a time-travel score, with Bulat akin to Chrono Trigger’s intrepid adventurer, going back into the past to shape the events of the future. Throughout, Bulat pays tribute to the magic of creation and the spellwork of performance. This is the truest location of Basia’s Palace: not just the Mile End jam-space where she recorded much of this LP; not just her home, her family, or her searching spirit. But the moment itself - the one that happens on-stage, or in the instant of creation - when a song leaves Basia’s heart and leaps onto her lips.
Basia’s talent has also been recognised at scale: her songs have been adapted for major performances with symphony orchestras, and she has been invited to perform at prestigious tributes to Leonard Cohen, Daniel Lanois, Nick Cave and The Band. Since releasing her debut, she has shared the stage with artists like St Vincent, Sufjan Stevens, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, The National, Michael Kiwanuka, Daniel Lanois, Beirut, Destroyer, US Girls, Jim James and more. She’s been featured on NPR’s Tiny Desk Concerts, performed #LateShowMeMusic Series on the Late Show with Stephen Colbert, and on Later with Jools Holland, and received support from The Needle Drop, The New York Times and more. Bulat is a three-time Polaris Music Prize finalist and has been nominated for five JUNO Awards.
Price: £15 adv
Info/tickets: https://www.heymanchester.com/basia-bulat