Penny and Sparrow released their 7th studio album Olly Olly via I Love You / Thirty Tigers. The genre-bending collection was written entirely by Penny and Sparrow (except one song with John Paul White), and was self-produced and recorded over the past year. The band will kick off the Olly Olly World Tour on March 18 in Birmingham, AL. Tickets are on sale now.
Earlier this week, the band released the official video for “Cheyenne.” Under The Radar praised the band’s “…intimate chamber folk stylings with musical touches from the worlds of R&B, bedroom pop, and hip hop,” and said the song “…captures the band in evolution, exploring exciting new territory and carving out new possibilities.”
Stream and download Olly Olly.
“Olly Olly is our first ever entirely self-produced album. We built it, with Alabama & Texas friends, over the past 2 years in various living rooms, studios, kitchens & screened-in porches,” explain Penny and Sparrow’s Andy Baxter and Kyle Jahnke. “By virtue of where we are in life, this is our most eclectic sounding and ambitious record and we couldn’t be prouder of it. It is exactly what we wanted it to be and it houses so many brand new directions for us…(our first feature, our first murder ballad, prevalent sample usage & 808’s) We hope it’s exactly what you need it to be.”
Olly Olly has received praise from Apple Music’s Record Bin Radio with Kelly McCartney, The Bluegrass Situation, and Atwood Magazine who called the album’s first single “Adeline,” “Intimate and effervescent…a beautiful show of emotional radiance.”
Olly Olly marks the first time the pair has worked without an outside producer and recorded songs that completely forgo the use of acoustic instruments. The 12 songs that comprise the album were written during the last year, when the band found their calendar completely empty. The duo found themselves amidst a tumultuous period where Jahnke moved to Waco, TX and became intensely lonely in a new city he could not explore or build a community in, while Baxter was based in Florence, AL where he had just begun therapy for the first time.
“Andy and I talk about the process of making this record like a sort of musical Rumspringa,” Jahnke says. “It was an opportunity to truly become ourselves, to evolve outside of the roles we’d been put in—or put ourselves in—because of the way we’d grown up.”
“The idea of calling out to everyone in hiding to reveal themselves and be free just resonated with us on a fundamental level,” says Baxter about the central theme surrounding the album and its title Olly Olly. “In a sense, that’s what we’re doing with this album.”
Olly Olly follows Penny and Sparrow’s critically acclaimed 6th studio album Finch which debuted at #2 on the Billboard Heatseekers Chart and #4 on the Billboard Vinyl Album Sales Chart, and has since racked up more than 40 million streams. The album was praised by NPR Music, The Associated Press, No Depression, Paste and many more. NPR’s World Cafe called the album “a collection of new songs that showcase the duo’s celestial harmonies, songs with stories that unfold like wild, vivid dreams,” while Atwood Magazine called it a “masterpiece.”
Penny and Sparrow World Tour Dates:
03/18: Birmingham, AL – Saturn *
03/19: Atlanta, GA – Variety Playhouse *
03/21: Bluffton, SC – Roasting Room *
03/22: Charlotte, NC – Neighborhood Theater *
03/24: Asheville, NC – Orange Peel *
03/25: Chattanooga, TN – Walker Theater *
03/26: Raleigh, NC – Cat’s Cradle *
03/27: Annapolis, MD – Ram’s Head *
03/29: Washington, DC – Union Stage
03/30: New York, NY – LPR ^
04/01: Boston, MA – Brighton Music Hall ^
04/02: Montreal, QC – Ritz ^
04/03: Toronto, ON – Adelaide Hall ^
04/05: Ann Arbor, MI – The Ark *
04/06: Chicago, IL – Lincoln Hall *
04/08: Minneapolis, MN – Cedar Cultural Center *
04/09: Kansas City, MO – recordBar *
04/10: St. Louis, MO – Old Rock House *
04/12: Louisville, KY – Headliners *
04/13: Cincinnati, OH – Ludlow Garage *
04/21: Florence, AL – Shoals Theater *
04/22: Nashville, TN – Basement East *
04/23: Knoxville, TN – Bijou Theater *
04/28: Houston, TX – Heights Theater *
04/29: Austin, TX – Paramount Theater *
04/30: Dallas, TX – Majestic Theater *
05/10: Phoenix, AZ – Crescent Ballroom *
05/11: San Diego, CA – Belly Up *
05/13: Los Angeles, CA – Regent Theater *
05/14: San Francisco, CA – Chapel Theater *
05/17: Portland, OR – Aladdin Theater *
05/18: Seattle, WA – Neumos *
05/20: Salt Lake City, UT – State Room *
05/21: Fort Collins, CO – The Armory *
05/22: Denver, CO – Gothic Theater
09/07: London, UK – Nell’s
09/08: Manchester, UK – Night & Day
09/09: Dublin, IE – Academy 2
09/10: Glasgow, UK – Attic Bar
09/14: Paris, FR – Les Estoiles
09/15: Amsterdam, NL – Melkweg
09/16: Cologne, DE – Theater der Wohngemeinschaft
09/17: Hamburg, DE – Haekken
09/19: Stockholm, SE – Nalen Klubb
09/21: Oslo, NO – Krøsset
09/22: Berlin, DE – Privetclub
09/23: Prague, CZ – Cafe V Lese
09/24: Vienna, AT – B72
09/25: Munich, DE – Heppel & Ettlich
09/28: Zurich, CH – Papiersaal
09/29: Stuttgart, DE – Club Cann
09/30: Milan, IT – Arci Bellezza
10/01: Frankfurt, DE – St. Peters Kirche
* – with Lera Lynn
^ – with Annika Bennett
Olly Olly Tracklist:
01) Adeline
02) Alabama Haint
03) Need You
04) Baking In The Summer
05) Cheyenne
06) Lacuna
07) Eden/Lia
08) Voodoo
09) Over-Under-Lude (feat. Tobe Nwigwe)
10) Gogogo
11) Innkeepers
12) Get Along
