Durand Jones, lead singer of soul outfit Durand Jones and The Indications, is stepping away from his collaborative work with the band for his deeply personal debut solo album, Wait Til I Get Over. Much of the new project is centered on his relationship to his hometown of Hillaryville, Louisiana, a town first established as a form of reparations to previously enslaved Black Americans.
He has shared the first single, “Lord Have Mercy.” It’s a raw and raucous tune mixing R&B, Southern Rock and Roll with a touch of the Muscle Shoals groove.
The accompanying video directed by McCray Sutherlin & Will Niava cuts back and forth between footage of the rural swamps of Louisiana from present day and from the 1920s, capturing the generational struggle of the people of Hillaryville from Jones’ time and from that of his grandmother’s.
“The interlude ends with my grandmother telling us how she felt about Hillaryville back in the day. Hillaryville is no longer a sanctuary town or ‘place you’d most want to live’. Most people in my generation and younger dream of escaping a place like Hillaryville. And for many, the dream never becomes something more,” Jones said in a release. “Life can find a way to keep you there if you will let it. I wanted to express this thought through sound in a raw, wild and raucous way. A build of a groove that feels like it is driving through a muddy swamp. Trapped.”
Wait Til I Get Over will be available May 5th on Dead Oceans.
