Damien Jurado Shares 20-Year-Old Song "Lincoln"

Longtime local singer/songwriter Damien Jurado is following up last year’s The Horizon Just Laughed with an intimate new album called In the Shape of a Storm. Recorded in just two hours, the record is stripped down to just Jurado and his guitar. Earlier this month he shared the album’s lead single “South” and, today, he’s following it up with a 20-year-old song titled “Lincoln.” Jurado says this of the genesis of the solemn tune:

“‘Lincoln,’ written in 1998, was originally slated for my third album not yet titled, Ghost of David. I had 13 songs recorded for the album onto a newly purchased digital 8-track machine. And, when the day came to mix the finished album, an error done on my part was made, erasing everything. Now under a deadline with the label to turn in a new album, I came up with the bright idea to scrap every song I had written for the album, and start anew.

All original material was written, and then recorded in a period of less than a week for Ghost of David. Years later, I would come across the only recorded demo I had made for the original album on a cassette. This song was ‘Lincoln.’ Over the years I considered ‘Lincoln’ for many of my albums, but the song just couldn't find the proper place to land. That was until I went in to record my latest album, In the Shape of a Storm. It felt not only fitting to put it on the record, but to have it be the opening song.”

In The Shape Of A Storm is Jurado’s fourteenth record and first for Mama Bird Recording Co. and comes out April 12. Last year, John Richards sat down with Jurado for an extended chat about The Horizon Just Laughed that can be heard here. Below, listen to “Lincoln” and watch Jurado’s KEXP in-studio performance from 2012.