She & Him Preview Dusty Springfield Cover, Set New LP Release Date
On December 2nd, She & Him — the duo made up of Zooey Deschanel and M. Ward — will release their fifth album, Classics. The project consists of 13 standards, from “Stars Fell on Alabama” to “Unchained Melody,” all of them recorded live in the studio. This week, the duo premiered “Stay Awhile,” a song originally made famous by soul singer Dusty Springfield. Listen to the track below.
Deschanel, best known for her work as an actress on Fox’s sitcom New Girl and in the films Elf and (500) Days of Summer, wraps her velvety voice around the love song’s lyrics, infusing them with a sense of urgency by holding notes to their near breaking point. Ward, meanwhile, plays snaking Dick Dale-like licks that would fit nicely on the soundtrack to a Quentin Tarantino film. The collaborative end result causes “Stay Awhile” to linger well after the last chord.
Together, She & Him have recorded three studio albums, as well as a Christmas release. The pair’s last project was Volume 3, released in May of 2013 on the indie label Merge Records. Classics, recorded for Columbia, marks the duo’s first album on a major label.
Here’s Classics‘ full track list:
- “Stars Fell on Alabama”
- “Oh No, Not My Baby”
- “It’s Not for Me to Say”
- “Stay Awhile”
- “This Girl’s in Love With You”
- “Time After Time”
- “She”
- “Teach Me Tonight”
- “It’s Always You”
- “Unchained Melody”
- “I’ll Never Be Free”
- “Would You Like to Take a Walk”
- “We’ll Meet Again”