Indie Pop Artist Geographer Announces New Album ‘A Mirror Brightly’; Shares New Single “You Never Know”

Synth-pop visionary Geographer announces his new full-length album, A Mirror Brightly, will be released on February 23, 2024. Mostly self-produced, he tapped Taylor Locke (Rooney, Linda Thompson, The New Pornographers), James Riotto (John Vanderslice, Samantha Crain), and Daniel Che (Run River North) for some finishing touches. It will include already released singles, “The Burning Handle,” “Van Halen,” “I Don’t Remember It Starting” and “One/Other.”

Tackling the album in increments, like a philosophical manifesto, he worked on it on-and-off beginning in the summer of 2022. For the record, Mike Deni, the atmospheric-pop act’s frontman, has assumed the role of thinking man’s anthropologist, picking through the wreckage around us in a world increasingly ensnared in everything from religion to social media. While it is still deeply personal, it’s not simply autobiographical like his previous releases.

Deni explains, “I focused on my experience moving through the world: feeling like an outcast, being denied love in its many forms, and struggling to find meaning in an existence that looked increasingly like a void the more I peered into the glass. This record takes that existential shock but explores it through humanity as a whole, rather than just me as an individual.”

Today, Geographer shares the latest single, “You Never Know,” off the upcoming record, along with an official video that features some incredible dance moves choreographed by his partner Monica Reyes. When describing the track he adds, “All of life around us is a mystery.  And we do our best to explain it.  But why are we so uncomfortable admitting that it’s all just our best guess?  Why do people get punished throughout history, for making a different one?  And are we that insecure in our beliefs that we have to galvanize them into facts in order to maintain them at all?  That was my jumping off point for this track.  Exploring the remarkable human ability to lie to oneself.  All in service of what, discomfort with our own mortality, the apparent futility of our actions, the seemingly random and often cruel passage of events?  We try so hard to figure out what’s going on.  I certainly have, and it’s brought me mostly grief.  Maybe it would be better to accept that we don’t, and never will, know.”

LISTEN + SHARE “YOU NEVER KNOW”

Geographer is also excited to announce he will join chillwave pioneers Small Black on a US tour this fall. The tour launches at Bowery Ballroom on October 21st and makes its way down the East and West coast including stops at the iconic Pappy & Harriet’s in Joshua Tree, and The Lodge Room in Los Angeles, before wrapping Portland, OR at Mississippi Studios on November 18th.

Formed in San Francisco, Geographer is the moniker for the now Los Angeles-based Mike Deni. Part social scientist, part troubadour, if Geographer is an expert at anything, it’s precisely chronicling life’s imperfections. He has headlined many national tours, played Outside Lands, Just Like Heaven, Firefly, Treefort, and other festivals, released three critically acclaimed albums, including 2021’s Down and Out In The Garden Of Earthly Delights, and has performed with such musical luminaries as K.Flay, The Flaming Lips, Young The Giant, Tycho, Ratatat, Betty Who, and Tokyo Police Club.

TOUR DATES SUPPORTING SMALL BLACK:

10/21   Bowery Ballroom                  New York, NY

10/22   Johnny Brenda’s                   Philadelphia, PA

10/23   Brighton Music Hall               Allston, MA

10/24   The Atlantis                           Washington, DC

11/9     Pappy & Harriet’s                  Pioneertown, CA

11/10   Soda Bar                               San Diego, CA

11/11   Lodge Room                          Los Angeles, CA

11/12   The Independent                   San Francisco, CA

11/13   Harlow’s                                Sacramento, CA

11/15   Fox Cabaret                          Vancouver, Canada

11/16   Madame Lou’s                      Seattle, WA

11/18   Mississippi Studios               Portland, OR

Track List

1. Light In The Dark
2. I Don’t Remember It Starting
3. One / Other
4. The Burning Handle
5. You Never Know
6. Learning How To Lose: Act 1
7. Learning How To Lose: Conclusion
8. Van Halen
9. Improvisation for Broken Wurlitzer (Interlude)
10. Everyone
11. Except You (Interlude)
12. Got It Wrong
13. I Ignored Everything I Could (Interlude)
14. And I Won’t Be Here When It Ends