Premiere: Timothy Nelson goes acoustic indie-rock with new single, Biding Time

Premiere: Timothy Nelson goes acoustic indie-rock with new single, Biding Time

The track – far more stripped-back and acoustic than his last single – shows the Perth-based musician in his songwriting prime.

Timothy Nelson is a great songwriter – that's something that doesn't need explaining. Over the last five years, the Perth-based musician has blossomed into one of the city's most remarkable storytellers, with his glistening alt-rock-indie-pop-fusion being a mainstay in the local live music sphere that time and time again over this period, has reached new peaks. In everything Timothy Nelson has put out, a sense of evolution and growth has been behind it; a real treasure to watch someone so prevalent in our local, homegrown scene thrive into someone special, bit by bit, over the space of five years worth of releases.

Earlier this year, everything seemed to be coming together with the release of Your House, a teasing moment for the musician's forthcoming new album that wasn't as much of an extension of his sound as an evolution – as we said with the single's release – "taking the sound that Timothy Nelson has refined and become known for over the years, and layering it with a stronger emphasis for the hooks that often lay underneath his woozy indie, taking him into a more pop-centric direction as he goes."

It was undoubtedly a bit of a bright-eyed, wind-swept release, which makes his new single Biding Time a bit of a surprise. Comparative to Your HouseBiding Time is a lot more stripped-back and subtle; an acoustic approach to Timothy Nelson's sound that really emphasises the storytelling, songwriting core of his work but with a sense of brooding darkness and emotive potency, which really comes through his low-slung vocal. It's still earworming and catchy – as you'd expect – but there's clearly a darker thing going on, and you can feel that in every moment of the single's rich, aching vocal.

"It’s quite dark really… love, death, and a downward spiral that can only go so much further," he says, without going too deep into the single – but he doesn't have to, you can hear the darkness through the single's underlying sounds. "Essentially, it’s about two people who are at crossroads, both with themselves, and each other."

Continuing, he goes on about how the record he initially written – reflected by Your House, being its lead single – has inspired what's incoming beyond that, with the work he's written in the past six months reflective of the chaotic, sombre world around him. "I started making this album before everything shut down, but over the last few months I’ve written so much new music and also had some time to rethink what I want this next record to be," he says. "My last record was really focused on this power-pop thing, whereas I think this record is going to be more eclectic. So those two songs being so different from each is kind of an indication of what you’ll hear when it comes out."

Take a dive into Biding Time below, as it premieres on Pilerats ahead of its release tomorrow, July 31st.

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