With a new album out on Concord Records, DeVotchKa finally return to San Diego with a show at the Observatory North Park on Friday, Sept. 28.
The indie-rock band's latest studio full-length album, "This Night Falls Forever," has been seven years in the making. Still, it stays close to their previous effort stylistically and thematically. Like 2011's "100 Lovers," the new record also encapsulates an endless range of human emotions through the familiar use of orchestral strings and the captivating, quivering pitch of frontman, Nick Urata.
In an instant, listening to "This Night Falls Forever" becomes an intimate yet refreshing experience, like going back to that old place or person you thought you left behind for good and surprisingly finding something new.
The nostalgia strikes hard and loud, starting with the album’s opening track and first single, "Straight Shot" -- a testament to New York City and the years he spent there in his youth, Urata said, and it continues throughout the album's following nine tunes, from "Love Letters" to "Break Up Song."
"We all go through the same things," Urata said of heartbreak, loss and the longing for someone or something that suddenly disappears. "Although when it’s happening, you feel like you’re the only person in the universe that it’s happening to."
The new album represents an escape from the mundane dullness of reality and a deep dive into times long gone and heart wounds still too sore.
"I listen to music … to connect with the bigger aspects of the universe and the world, outside of everyday life," Urata said during a recent phone chat. "I don’t put my head in the sand when it comes to reality, but I use songwriting as an escape."
These seven years, however, have been anything but dull for the songwriter, who has been busy collecting a few more soundtrack credits (he earned a Grammy nomination for his contributions to the Academy Award-winning 2006 film "Little Miss Sunshine"), working on shows such as "A Series of Unfortunate Events" and the upcoming film "The True Adventures of Wolfboy."
And while traveling to his beloved New York City to kick off the tour, Urata said he’s excited to come back to San Diego.
"[It’s] the first place I ever landed in California," he recalled. "And being a kid from New York, it’s almost like everything they told you California was going to be like."
After all, he added, it’s always nice to be close to the beach.
DeVotchKa headline the Observatory North Park on Friday, Sept. 28, with Orkesta Mendoza opening. Tickets are available here.
Ombretta Di Dio is a story producer at NBC San Diego and a stand-up comedian from Italy. Contact her here.
