Indie-folk artist Flora Hibberd has announced her debut album, Swirl, out January 17, 2025 on 22Twenty. Recorded in Eau Claire, Wisconsin during a sweltering summer, this body of work explores the weight and power of words, their different meanings for different people, their evocative power, their problems, and their possibility.
Along with the announcement, Hibberd shared the album’s lead single ‘Code.’ It is a lucid introduction to the record’s sound, that marries the mystical and mundane through lush production and captivating vocals.
“‘Code’ was so hard to get right, it went through many variations,” Flora Hibberd says. “We made this version late one night after driving to get burgers in a storm, I sat under the piano singing into an Electrovoice RE11 to avoid drum bleed, we played the song over and over until we fell into a groove. I love all the synths, each their own little signaling system, and the weird backing vocals, and the upright piano opening up the second instrumental. The descending sound in the intro and third verse was made by whirling a piece of plastic tubing around, recording it into a Casio keyboard and then playing it as a sample. The clarity when the chorus comes back right after, so satisfying.”
The single is accompanied by a video directed and edited by Roberto Cicogna. It follows a character as she roams across a town, searching for the source of a mysterious radio signal. The sound ultimately leads her to Flora and the rest of the band.
Swirl:
- Auto Icon
- Remote Becoming Holy
- Code
- Every Incident Has Left Its Mark
- Canopy
- Baby
- Jesse
- Lucky You
- Fern
- Still No Closer
- Ticket
