C. Gibbs Photo credit: Andi Stover
C. Gibbs has spent decades making music for people who hear the world a little sideways. Across 16 albums — solo and with projects like Lucinda Black Bear and He Arrived By Helicopter — the California songwriter has drifted through space folk, chamber psych, Northern soul, post-punk and Americana with a restless, cinematic touch.
His new album, Against Frail Beats on a Teetering Limb, is due July 10. The record’s emotional centerpiece, “Man in Shorts” — premiering today by The Big Takeover, confronts the loss of a friend and co-worker to addiction and relapse with haunting honesty and understated beauty.
Says Gibbs:
“It’s probably the most personal song on the record. We worked together writing songs in trauma facilities and rehabs, helping people through music and addiction recovery. He trained me in the work. People loved him — he had this huge spirit, this sharp wit, and knew how to bring lightness into very heavy rooms.”
After surviving a devastating car accident, Gibbs’ friend later died from a fentanyl overdose, a loss that deeply shook him. “Sometimes you expect ‘the call,’” Gibbs recalls. “This time I was floored.” The song’s title came from an early exchange between the two.
Says Gibbs:
“He told me we weren’t supposed to wear shorts to work — while he was wearing shorts himself every single day. Then he said, ‘Ah, fuck it, wear shorts.’ That irreverent humor is exactly how I remember him.”
Gibbs has been a touring member of Foetus, and Modern English, and has opened for Son Volt and John Mellencamp while earning praise from major outlets. Rolling Stone called him “the country brother of Tom Waits,” while The New York Times praised music that “never settles down,” wandering through “cracked cabaret oompah and Beatles-flavored ballads.” Billboard declared, “rarely do you hear songs that are this deep, this profound.”
The forthcoming record finds Gibbs entering a new chapter with a fully West Coast band featuring Jules Stewart, Joshua Mooers and European collaborator Frank Heer, alongside guest vocalists Alex Bergan, Chloe Lou and Shelbi Bennett. Produced and mixed by Jon Wubbena, the album was partially recorded between London, Brooklyn and Southern California while Gibbs was working on a production of The Cherry Orchard at St. Ann’s Warehouse.
New music on the way? Pitch Big Takeover Exclusives.
