Today, Plants and Animals are releasing a brand new single and video for ‘Love That Boy’, an intimate song created out of childhood memories and reflection about the constant evolution of family – The Jungle, their fifth studio album, is set to be released October 23rd via Secret City Records / Remote Control.
Warren Spicer shares the inspiration behind the song : “It’s a song about my family, present and past, but it feels more like a meditation. I was upset, frustrated and feeling like no one knew me—the kid me, the me I still feel I am. And then writing the song chilled me out and put me right. It was a way to connect with my dead parents and with my new life as a dad, and to give everyone a proper hug.”
The music video, directed by Yann-Manuel Hernandez, was also inspired by Warren’s early life memories. The singer-songwriter continues: “I have a strong memory of being a kid in the backseat of my parents’ car driving down the road at night in Halifax. The moon was bright, and I watched it as it danced, interrupted by trees, like a strobe light or a stop-motion film. It followed us as we drove, and I couldn’t figure out how it was doing that. Nothing else I could see out the window kept up. Why is the moon not moving? I hadn’t thought of that for a very long time, but somehow the song brought me back to that place.”
The Jungle starts with electronic drums that sound like insects at night. A whole universe comes alive in the dark. It’s beautiful, complex and unsettling. Systematic and chaotic. All instinct, no plan. Voices taunt, “yeah, yeah, yeah”. This tangled time in which we find ourselves is reflected back in shadows.
Every song is such a landscape. The first one grinds to a halt and you become a kid looking out a car window at the moon, wondering how it’s still on your tail as you speed past a steady blur of trees. You watch a house go up in a yellow strobe that echoes the disco weirdness of Giorgio Moroder, Donna Summer and David Bowie. You get pummeled by a rhythm then set free by a sudden change of scenery—the wind stops, clarity returns. You’re under a streetlight in Queens, soft focus, slow motion, falling in love. You speak French now too, in case you didn’t already. Bienvenue.
These are personal experiences made in a volatile world, and they reflect that world right back at us, even by accident. There’s one song Nic sings to his teenage son who was dealing with climate change anxiety and drifting into uncharted independence. The band carries it out slowly together into a sweet blue horizon. Warren wrote the words to another shortly after losing his father. It’s about the things we inherit not necessarily being the things we want. In a broader sense, that’s where a lot of people find themselves right now.
Plants and Animals are an iconic Montreal-based trio that began playing together as kids and emerged on the international scene in 2008 with Parc Avenue. The band has developed a varied cult following ever since, built on the shoulders of their self-produced records and their intense live shows. Parc Avenue was a critically acclaimed record (Pitchfork8/10) released during the famous Montreal-is-the-new-Seattle music moment. This release set Plants and Animals as an incredible live force, a powerful songwriting trio and opened doors for them to tour the world many times over with people like Portugal. The Man, Gnarls Barkley and more. Three other releases followed and kept the band’s status up high: La La Land (2010) “they’re complicated and gorgeous [songs] and feel as innate as desire itself.” (PasteMagazine), The End of That (2012) “vibrant, constantly rewarding” (Spin) and Waltzed in from the Rumbling (2016) “… the strike rate is remarkably high” ★★★★ (Q Magazine). The band was shortlisted (2008) and longlisted (2010) for the Polaris Music Prize and received multiple Juno Awards and ADISQ Awards nominations over the years.