Hagiographies and Hit Pieces: Launch Announcement!

At long last, a multi-year odyssey of writing, rewriting, re-rewriting, recording and production has come to an end, and Hagiographies and Hit Pieces is set to drop the second week of July. Coull’s third full-length record is a sweeping concept album that explores the predicaments of a startling assortment of characters grappling with their strange fates — set against a backdrop of intricate orchestral arrangements and unmatched virtuosity on the piano. The album will be available to stream on Apple Music, Spotify, Youtube Music and other major streaming platforms.

For the Montreal crowd, a launch event is taking place at Cabaret Lion d’Or on the evening of Wednesday, July 5th, where Johnny will be accompanied by talented bandmates Olivier Boyer-Masutti, Al McElcheran, Dan Legault, Mélina Laplante, and Marie-Ève Blais. Songs new and old will be performed, tales will be told, drinks will be sloshed, and ties will be loosened. Doors open at 7:00 pm and the show will commence at 8:00 sharp. All ages are welcome. Those who cannot afford a ticket are invited to contact info@johnnycoull.com to receive a free pass, no questions asked.

A smaller launch will be taking place in Toronto at The Cameron House on the evening of Thursday, July 27th. Further details to follow.

Track 6: I Left My Baby Grand in New Orleans

I've always had a thing for places that are a bit rough around the edges. Bangkok is one that springs to mind; New Orleans is another. It might be that, having grown up in the gentle and nurturing clutch of a polite scene like Montreal, my heart sometimes aches for the places that are altogether too humid and boisterous and prone to fits of seedy bacchanalia.

Broken home is where the broken heart is, I thought one day after seven weeks in Spain that seemed like years. And here I was, down in the same old digs and duds, out in the streets where strangers greet you home again.

They call me the terminal lover, born on the last day of time. I was robbed of a past that could heal me, fleeced of a future of crime.

Send me some good news from the front, tell me the lines will always be the same. Tell me the wanderers still know my name.

They tell me that I’ve wandered round this world to places that I have never seen. Whole nations scraped from the face of the earth, whole years in a dream.

I left my baby grand down in New Orleans, outside a bloody battle on Frenchmen Street, where the jazz angels sat up so long into the night. All the red light girls and all the trumpeteers, the stink of the swamp and the empty beers: blues but not a tear to be shed in sight.

Scene: a dusk-lit opening. Pete’s in line just hoping; he has plastic bags of posters, magazines and paper roses. As his movie queen approaches, the volcanic crowd encroaches, and, at last, he’s got his moment. He says: “Baby, won’t you read some lines with me?”

Eden-ite defectors, traveling with steel detectors, pause to pitch their tents out in his field. He hears the buzzer grooving, as he rises to get moving.

Even paradise has a Harley Street, some quack trying to make a buck. He said: “Here’s a pill to cure your pain, and one more for good luck.”

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