A few weeks ago, Annie Hardy, the driving force behind the LA-based indie rock project Giant Drag, staged a stark online hoax by pretending she had died. At the time, she wrote, “I thought if only for a second we could all shift dimensional realities together and maybe find new appreciation for one another.” Earlier this week, Hardy, who is very much alive, unveiled a fresh Giant Drag single titled “Song For My Funeral.”
Hardy explains that she composed “Song For My Funeral” several years prior, after casually scrolling through the lengthy direct messages sent to her by one of her schizophrenic stalkers and noticing it ended with “I’m a father and a husband which makes it even more upsetting I should have to die. Well, leaving Monday. See you soon’.” She wrote the song as a way to process how rattled that DM left her, and her initial concept was to record it with an orchestra. Yet after numerous attempts, the version she’s releasing is a lean, idiosyncratic, wordplay-heavy solo acoustic piece that unfolds more slowly than expected and carries hints of the Moldy Peaches and maybe Daniel Johnston.
“Song For My Funeral” will appear on an upcoming Giant Drag record produced by Joe Cardamone, a former member of the Icarus Line. Cardamone also directed the black-and-white video for the track, in which Hardy dramatically arm-wrestles a string of opponents, including former MTV VJ Jesse Camp. I wish these folks would be more diligent about keeping their elbows on the table, but perhaps that isn’t the point. Watch it below.
