Since announcing her debut solo project in January, anticipation has been mounting for Nanna’s new album How to Start a Garden, out today via Republic Records. She’s given fans a sneak peek at the 11-song project with the releases of three advance tracks: “Godzilla,” “Crybaby,” and “Disaster Master.” Produced by Nanna alongside collaborators Aaron Dessner (The National, Taylor Swift) and Josh Kaufman (Bonny Light Horseman, War on Drugs, Hiss Golden Messenger), How to Start a Garden is a tremendous solo introduction from this highly acclaimed singer, songwriter and producer.
How to Start a Garden was born from a fresh start - a place of starting over. Nanna knew this intuitively when she began to write the songs for her first solo album. In these ethereal yet grounded songs, she sings of being lost and hopeful, remaining calm through apocalypses large and small, with orchestration that feels as organic as a forest while also sculpted and modern.
As Nanna wrote these songs, she spent a lot of time considering her neighbor’s lush garden in her native home Iceland, watching him tend it, watching it grow. A garden is a conversation with the seasons—everything constantly in a state of ending and beginning. It seemed like the perfect image for where she was then, and for the shape this album was taking.
“A lot of things had to end for this album to become what it is,” said Nanna. “A long term relationship, my prior sense of home and belonging and security. But it’s also an ode to the joy of new beginnings: new relationships, a new home, new friendships, a new sense of self. The album takes place in this in-between state. I wrote it in Iceland and recorded it between Iceland and upstate New York. It captures a very specific time in my life of curiosity and reflection, when I felt very much in the middle of a surreal new reality and didn’t have a clear path in my direction—like how a snowstorm is somehow chaotic but calm at the same time.”
See full track listing below:
“How To Start A Garden” (Written and produced by Nanna, Additional Production Josh Kaufman)
“Sputnik” (Written and Produced by Nanna, Additional Production by Josh Kaufman)
“Crybaby” (Written by Nanna, Produced by Nanna and Aaron Dessner)
“Disaster Master” (Written by Nanna, Produced by Josh Kaufman)
“The Vine / 13” (Written by Nanna & Ragnar Thorhallson, Produced by Nanna)
“Godzilla” (Written and Produced by Nanna)
“Blood Clot / Andvaka” (Written and Produced by Nanna)
“Milk” (Written by Nanna and Aaron Dessner, Produced by Aaron Dessner)
“Igloo” (Written and Produced by Nanna)
“Voyager” (Written by Nanna, Produced by Josh Kaufman)
“Seabed” (Written by Nanna, Aaron Dessner & Ragnar Thorhallson, Produced by Nanna and Aaron Dessner)
After much writing and producing in her apartment in Reykjavik - her cabin in the wilderness and upstate New York - Nanna turned to her close friends and collaborators, Ragnar Þórhallsson and Bjarni Þór Jensson. Þórhallsson assisted with songwriting, piano score and additional instrumentals, and Þór Jensson brought his expertise as a musician and engineer.
Nanna also released a visualizer for the title track today. Filmed in Iceland, she and her visual team - Silken Weinberg and Angela Ricciardi - made a dangerous trek into the elements in order to capture the perfect shot.
“We snuck into the Glacier called Snæfellsjökull to do the shoot,” said Nanna. “We drove up an icy path to get there in cars that were not meant for those roads. We shot for about an hour and the wind started to pick up. It felt like a storm was coming so we had to leave before things got too scary for us.”
Nanna continued, “I was working on this song throughout most of the album making process, adding little things along the way. I wanted this to be the opening track and have the intro feel like you are entering a storybook - a fantasy. I imagined a garden opening up, little things appearing as you walk further in, but then you are met with winter. As soon as my voice comes in, I wanted it to feel like we are at the very beginning. There is no garden. There is only hope for one.”
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