{"id":2441434,"date":"2019-03-07T10:04:12","date_gmt":"2019-03-07T17:04:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rollingstone.com\/?p=803054"},"modified":"2019-03-07T10:04:12","modified_gmt":"2019-03-07T17:04:12","slug":"song-you-need-to-know-hand-habits-pacify","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/music-news\/song-you-need-to-know-hand-habits-pacify\/","title":{"rendered":"Song You Need to Know: Hand Habits, \u2018pacify\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The third track on Hand Habits\u2019 great new album, placeholder<\/em>, comes on like a folk song, with Meg Duffy finger-picking soft solo acoustic patterns. The effect is peaceful, calming, with a hint of something else underneath the surface.<\/p>\n

Then, about 40 seconds into \u201cpacify,\u201d Duffy begins singing, and the song swerves in another direction. There are drums and a bass in the mix now, sounding more like a band, but Duffy still feels alone and low: \u201cFar from where it all began\/Blind to consequence\/Silence from the only one who understands.\u201d Their guitar loops through backward scrapes and upside-down flutters, creating an arty ice-planet ambience that enhances the warmth in Duffy\u2019s voice.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s real skill and subtlety in Duffy\u2019s playing throughout \u201cpacify,\u201d which makes sense given their growing reputation as a first-rate session guitarist for acts like Kevin Morby, Weyes Blood, and William Tyler. In a revealing anecdote from an interview<\/a> with Pitchfork\u2019s Quinn Moreland earlier this week, Duffy discussed the creative trade-offs involved in that line of work: After playing a pained, gorgeous slide-guitar part on the War on Drugs\u2019 2017 single \u201cHolding On,\u201d<\/a> they ended up sidelined on a national TV performance of the song. \u201cIt was cool, but sort of strange to be like, Wow, this song people know the words to and the slide part is such a huge part of the song and I\u2019m just playing the acoustic guitar<\/em>,\u201d Duffy said. \u201cAs a session player I think you have to be okay with that.\u201d<\/p>\n

There are no such compromises on placeholder<\/em>, an album full of songs that showcase Duffy\u2019s gifts front and center. \u201cpacify\u201d is one of the best examples, a song about uncertainty and guilt \u2014 \u201cI don\u2019t want to pacify you with excuses,\u201d goes the chorus \u2014 that eloquently mirrors those feelings in sound. In the song\u2019s wordless coda, the acoustic guitar figure comes back, this time with a little more distortion around it. It sounds like acceptance.<\/p>\n

via:: Rolling Stone<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The third track on Hand Habits\u2019 great new album, placeholder, comes on like a folk song, with Meg Duffy finger-picking soft solo acoustic patterns. The effect is peaceful, calming, with a hint of something else underneath the surface. Then, about 40 seconds into \u201cpacify,\u201d Duffy begins singing, and the song swerves in another direction. There […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[50],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-2441434","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-music-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-15 03:39:57","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSPN The Valley's Quality Rock","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2441434","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2441434"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2441434\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2441434"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2441434"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kspn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2441434"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}