Ezra Furman today releases her new record, All Of Us Flames via Bella Union and Anti Records. Inside the world of All of Us Flames, the end of the patriarchal capitalist empire seems both imminent and inevitable, a turn down a path we can’t see yet but can’t avoid, either. Produced by John Congleton, All of Us Flames unleashes Furman’s songwriting in an open, vivid sound whose boldness heightens the music’s urgency. 

A singer, songwriter, and author whose incendiary music has soundtracked the Netflix show Sex Education, Furman has for years woven together stories of queer discontent and unlikely, fragile intimacies. She has a knack for zeroing in on the light that sparks when struggling people find each other and ease each other’s course. All of Us Flames widens that focus to a communal scope, painting transformative connections among people who unsettle the stories power tells to sustain itself. 

“Ezra Furman is on a roll… All Of Us Flames sparkles… Her observations are succinct, original and fearless.” 
Mail On Sunday

“All Of Us Flames reveals a more humble and equanimous Furman, an empathetic artist still committed to truth-telling, still railing against the injustices of the world.” 
The Line of Best Fit
 
“Her most ambitious collection of pop brilliance.” 
Loud & Quiet

“All Of Us Flames roars with emotional truth and transformative power… A revitalised rock’n’roll soundtrack for a push towards the brightening of the light.” 
Uncut

“Bold, profoundly honest, and deeply insightful, this is an inspired return, one that might rank as her finest.” 
Clash

“One of the best, most important albums of the year… All Of Us Flames has the potential to go down in history”
Gigwise

“Diverse, tuneful and vibrant, it’s often euphoric.” 
Record Collector

Ezra Furman today releases a new single/video, “Poor Girl A Long Way From Heaven”, from her forthcoming record All Of Us Flames, out 26th August via Bella Union. On “Poor Girl A Long Way From Heaven”, Furman recounts a childhood encounter with God, a gesture of spiritual yearning that flows into the album’s biblical facets. “The spiritual life ain’t all pious platitudes,” she elaborates. “This song is about how weird it gets, when you’re in love with the Source of Being and She’s not texting you back. Ever since it hit me that I was never going to be loved and accepted on the scale of my pop star heroes, me and my bandmates have started to work on a different vision of pop, one more our own, one that gestures at the stranger truths of the human mind. Here we are in thrall to verbally adventurous nineties music like Bjork and Beck and the Silver Jews and them kinda non-linear geniuses.”

As for the video, directed by Haoyan of America, Furman “basically told Haoyan a story I made up about a trans Joan of Arc narrowly avoiding her public execution, and then gave him free reign to do whatever he wanted with it, as long as Daphne Always (also seen in our recent ‘Forever in Sunset’ video) played Joan. I adore the cracked brilliance of what came out.”

Early acclaim for All Of Us Flames:

“All Of Us Flames roars with emotional truth and transformative power… A revitalised rock’n’roll soundtrack for a push towards the brightening of the light.” Uncut – 8/10

“Bold, profoundly honest, and deeply insightful, this is an inspired return, one that might rank as her finest, most complete record to date.” Clash – 9/10

“If All Of Us Flames feels more hopeful, rest assured there is no downscaling of tension or combat. Inspired by the network within queer communities, Furman taps the Springsteen DNA in her helix of influences.” MOJO – 4 stars ****

“Diverse, tuneful and vibrant, it’ often euphoric: ‘Dressed in Black’, with its Spector-ish Wall of Sound, and ‘Forever in Sunset’, a Bruce Springsteen-style anthem reimagined for a 21st century queer community, are defiant in the face of oppression.” Record Collector – 4 stars ****

A singer, songwriter, and author whose incendiary music has soundtracked the Netflix show SexEducation, Furman has for years woven together stories of queer discontent and unlikely, fragile intimacies. All of Us Flames is “a queer album for the stage of life when you start to understand that you are not a lone wolf, but depend on finding your family, your people, how you work as part of a larger whole. I wanted to make songs for use by threatened communities, and particularly the ones I belong to: trans people and Jews.”

All of Us Flames is the third instalment in a trilogy of albums, beginning with 2018’s Springsteen-inflected road saga Transangelic Exodus and continuing with the punk rock fury of 2019’s Twelve Nudes. Writing much of Flames during the early months of the pandemic, Furman drove to seek solitude, parked in arbitrary quiet spots around Massachusetts, and began to write. The songs that came flowed toward ideas of communality and networks of care, systems of survival cultivated by necessity among people who have been historically deprived of them. With Furman’s widened focus, All of Us Flames paints transformative connections among people who unsettle the stories power tells to sustain itself.

Today, Ezra Furman returns with a new single, “Point Me Toward the Real”, and announces an extensive run of North American tour dates as well as UK festival appearances at Standon Calling and Green Man in July and August. “Point Me Toward the Real”, out today via Bella Union (and ANTI- in North America), marks Furman’s first solo release since 2019’s Twelve Nudes, and follows her stint soundtracking the hit Netflix show Sex Education. A tender and urgent ballad, “Point Me Toward the Real” reiterates Furman’s knack for crafting heartfelt earworms. “Cut me loose, cut me loose,” Furman cries atop dreamy horn arrangements by Nathaniel Walcott (Bright Eyes), “Let me get hurt // Let me feel // Cut my bound hands free and point me toward the real.” Featuring backing vocals from Shannon Lay and Debbie Neigher, “Point Me Toward the Real” was produced, engineered, and recorded by John Congleton (Angel Olsen, Future Islands, Sharon Van Etten). 

Of the track, Furman explains: “This is a neo-soul song about getting released from a psychiatric hospital, which has never happened to me. But really it’s a song about what you do right after abuse, imprisonment, a brush with death. Who do you call when it’s supposedly over? Where do you go? How do you know what you want?

“We’ve all recently been going through something terrifying. We’ve all made friends with death in the last two years. When I look to the future, I want to know who has my back? Whose back do I have? And what is real, what and who can I rely on? Point me toward the real; there’s no other direction I want to go.” 

This Sunday, Furman and her band – consisting of Ben Joseph (keyboards), Jordan Jordensen (bass), and Sam Durkes (drums) – will kick off their spring US tour at Northampton’s Iron Horse Music Hall. From there, they’ll make stops in Austin, Texas for SXSW, plus Los Angeles, Chicago, New York, and more. A full list of dates is below.

Ezra Furman Tour Dates:

Sun. Mar. 6 – Northampton, MA @ Iron Horse Music Hall (SOLD OUT)

Mon. Mar. 7 – Rochester, NY @ The Bug Jar

Tue. Mar. 8 – Columbus, OH @ Rumba Cafe (SOLD OUT)

Wed. Mar. 9 – Indianapolis, IN @ State Street Pub

Thu. Mar. 10 – Nashville, TN @ Third Man Records Blue Room

Sat. Mar. 12 – Atlanta, GA @ Aisle 5

Mon. Mar. 14 – Fort Worth, TX @ Tulips

Mar. 15-19 – Austin, TX @ SXSW

Thu. May 19 – Los Angeles, CA @ Teragram Ballroom *

Sat. May 21 – San Francisco, CA @ August Hall *

Mon. May 23 – Seattle, WA @ The Crocodile *

Tue. May 24 – Vancouver, BC @ Hollywood Theatre *

Wed. May 25 – Portland, OR @ Wonder Ballroom *

Thu. May 26 – Boise, ID @ Visual Arts Collective *

Sat. May 28 – Denver, CO @ Gothic Theatre *

Mon. May 30 – Des Moines, IA @ Gas Lamp *

Tue. May 31 – Minneapolis, MN @ Fine Line *

Wed. Jun. 1 – Chicago, IL @ Thalia Hall *

Thu. Jun. 9 – Somerville, MA @ Crystal Ballroom (Ezra Solo)

Thu. Jul. 21  – Valencia, ES @ Diversity Festival 

Sun. Jul. 24 – Hertfordshire, UK @ Standon Calling Festival

Thu. Aug. 18 – Crickhowell, UK @ Green Man Festival

Mon. Sep. 12 – Montreal, QC @ La Sala Rosa 

Tue. Sep. 13 – Toronto, ON @ Rec Room 

Wed. Sep. 14 – Detroit, MI @ The Loving Touch

Thu. Sep. 15 – Pittsburgh, PA @ Mr Small’s

Sun. Sep. 18 – Philadelphia, PA @ Underground Arts

Mon. Sep. 19 – Providence, RI @ Fete Ballroom

Tue. Sep. 20 – Boston, MA @ The Sinclair 

Wed. Sep. 21 – New York, NY @ Webster Hall 

Thu. Sep. 22 – Dover, DE @ Firefly Festival

* Support from Grace Cummings