Premiere: Mallory Chipman - "Same Hands”

Mallory Chipman is the real deal. Apologies to readers in Edmonton to whom it might seem that I’m stating the obvious; Chipman has been a staple in almost every part of the Edmonton music scene over the last decade, whether it’s as a jazz vocalist, as part of her alt-country group The Goddamnsels, or indulging in her hard rockin’ jazz fusion-y side with The Mystics. This year has seen Chipman releasing one single every month, and last month we learnt that not only does the songwriter have an album’s worth of singles out in 2024, but she has a full album of entirely new material dropping tomorrow called Songs to a Wild God. We’re pleased to give you a sneak peak of track five on the new album, “Same Hands”.

The song is a delightful exercise in minimalism; the whole thing is just the two chords, and we get to experience the way that Chipman and her collaborators can take such spartan building materials and build a cathedral out of them. The way that musical ideas get reused, recycled, and revisited throughout the runtime is reflected in the lyrics; Chipman paints scenes, and then revisits them, recontextualizes them, to tell a story about how some things change, but some things will always stay the same.

“Same Hands” can be streamed below, and the full album Songs to a Wild God comes out everywhere tomorrow, September 27th. If you happen to be at BreakOut West this weekend, you can catch Mallory performing at the Black Cat and Bud’s on Broadway.

- Sean Davis Newton