Quantcast
 
Bios

SHORT BIO

Since founding her own label MPress Records two decades ago, NYC-based alt-pop artist Rachael Sage has steadily released a slew of vibrant, dynamic albums described by Goldmine Magazine as "mesmerizing...thoughtful, pensive and flush with an emotional flourish, all carefully and adeptly executed." She has toured with an eclectic list of artists including Ani DiFranco, Beth Hart, Howard Jones, and Grammy® winners Shawn Colvin and Judy Collins – with whom she also recorded a critically-acclaimed duet of Neil Young's "Helpless". In addition to being a six-time Independent Music Award-winning musician and producer, Sage is also a John Lennon Contest Grand Prize winner who has performed at the Edinburgh Fringe, SXSW, and toured globally from Japan to Berlin with her band, The Sequins. Sage is also a visual artist and former ballet dancer who performed with the New York City Ballet. She is additionally a philanthropic advocate who has raised money for a wide range of causes, including WHY Hunger, American Refugee Committee, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Hospital and National Network For Youth (NN4Y). Her 2020 album Character yielded the Billboard-charting single "Blue Sky Days"; her latest project Poetica, an adventurous fusion of poetry with jazz, classical and Americana musical elements in the vein of Leonard Cohen and Laurie Anderson debuted in October 2021. Her current singles "Whistle Blow" and "The Other Side" are out now on MPress/Universal/Virgin, and her next full-length album The Other Side is due in July 2023.

"One of music's most inimitable iconoclasts." — BlackBook

"Her keen, ironic sense of humor and quirky sense of the profound is what makes her special as a songwriter" — Billboard

LONG BIO

Since founding her own label MPress Records two decades ago, NYC-based alt-pop artist and multi-instrumentalist Rachael Sage has steadily released 15 albums of vibrant, dynamic music with poetic, image-rich lyrics spanning subjects as wide as her inspirations. Often designing her own album artwork, costumes and musical instruments, Sage has toured with an eclectic list of artists including Ani DiFranco, Beth Hart, Sarah McLachlan, Judy Collins and Howard Jones. Raised mainly on classical music, doo-wop, 70s folk and British pop, Sage possesses a rare combination of musical ingenuity, visual dynamism and emotional insight. Her songs are cinematic and beautiful, and her production layered, lush and laced with orchestral surprises.

Sage's latest album The Other Side is as instantly hummable as it is lyrically poignant. Throughout the revelatory 15-track collection, Sage explores the connection between love, openness and mortality – reflecting on what it means to be human. Balancing the poetic lyricism for which she is best known with a newfound reverence for music as a healing tool, Sage is in the midst of a creative renaissance, merging her experience of survivorship with both music and activism. The Other Side is optimistic, powerful and beautifully timeless.. Sage – a self-described "cancer thriver" - muses, "This record encompasses a high and low search for resilience in this broken world. It is more stark than my previous work, and less afraid to look fear in the eye or give fate the finger." 
 
The album opens with the quietly powerful “Whistle Blow”, informed by blurred power dynamics and boundaries in the wake of many public figures’ bad behavior coming to light, in which Sage says "I decided to write from the imagined perspective of someone summoning the courage to speak out, stand up, and make it crystal clear that they have been mistreated by someone in a greater position of power.” With its distinctly Americana palette of slide and acoustic guitars and Sage's signature delicate finger picking, she hopes the empowering song will serve as a source of hope for anyone summoning the strength to stand up for themselves – and against oppression in any form.
 
“Flowers For Free” is poetic pop-rock at its most adventurous. Beatle-esque wah guitar, baroque trumpet flourishes, chamber strings & Sage’s pulsing piano ground this psychedelic song about never giving up on this earthly life, or into the temptation of complacency. With its rootsy, string-laden arrangement, Sage’s fresh, folk-pop take on Yazoo's classic "Only You" is both musically unexpected and a full-circle moment. Incorporating her childhood affection for drum-loops and ‘80s synths, she recruits her Jupiter-8 synthesizer alongside her folk guitar fingerpicking and Wurlitzer® piano. Sage effuses: "Yazoo's albums were absolutely timeless, and trendy arpeggiated synths never masked the fact that this song is as much an ear-worm as it is emotionally universal." 
 
The title track "The Other Side" ventures into gospel-tinged, Americana-pop terrain. Propelled by Sage's dynamic piano playing, this timely anthem reminds us that what's most important – in relationships, dreams or our quest for freedom in whatever form – is always worth waiting for. Sage confesses, "My hope is that this song encourages people to slow down just long enough to relish where they are right now, and not to take anything for granted including our innate human ability to reimagine the future we actually want, even if it seems elusive.”
 
Loyalty and friendship is another theme that runs through much of The Other Side.  "Deepest Dark" was written by Sage in high school, but it found its way back to her after she rediscovered an old lyric journal and recognized that the song resonated more to her now than it did in her teens. Sage recorded the song after binge-watching 'Stranger Things' in response to the beautifully portrayed friendships depicted in the show. The arpeggiated piano and plaintive chorus melody perfectly supports what Sage describes as a a tribute to these indelible characters, whose loyalty to one another and profound connections across bizarre and fearsome obstacles during the pandemic became the cultural zeitgeist we all needed.
 
The heartbreaking, sweeping ballad "I Made A Case" finds Sage duet-ing with UK pop icon Howard Jones, and revealing some of her most intimate and devastating lyrics. With its Bacharach-esque orchestral arrangement, Sage's album closer chronicles the classic dilemma of would-be lovers meeting at the wrong time with poetic urgency, lamenting: "Now I'm holding on for dear life / as this ship sinks way out of sight."
 
Produced by Sage with Grammy® winner Andy Zulla and longtime engineer Mikhail Pivovarov, The Other Side features her touring band The Sequins – drummer Andy Mac, cellist Ward Williams and violinist Kelly Halloran – alongside longtime collaborators cellist Dave Eggar (Coldplay), drummer Doug Yowell (Suzanne Vega), guitarists James Mastro (Patti Smith, Ian Hunter) & Jack Petruzzelli (Rufus Wainwright) and special guests Howard Jones and Nick Beggs (Kajagoogoo).

For Sage, survivorship now means balancing her ongoing commitment to staying healthy with a renewed sense of purpose: creating work that uplifts and empowers others in any way she possibly can. Currently on tour with Nell Bryden, the former ballerina says she has "come to realize that music is the most powerful healing tool I have ever encountered. It has quite literally saved my life, and I intend for the rest of my career to be a long, slow dance of gratitude."

For a full schedule of performances, visit rachaelsage.com