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Arcade Fire's Will Butler to release solo record Policy in 2015

21 November 2014, 11:56 | Written by Laurence Day

Will Butler of Arcade Fire has announced details of his debut solo record, Policy.

It's due out 16 March via Merge, and the Amazon product description is odd to say the least, signed off by Memphis Slim (who died in 1988). Read it below.

"Will Butler has been a member of the band Arcade Fire for over 10 years. This is his first release under his own name. Policy is American music in the tradition of the Violent Femmes, The Breeders, The Modern Lovers, Bob Dylan, Smokey Robinson, The Magnetic Fields, Ghostface Killah. And John Lennon (I know, but it counts). Music where the holy fool runs afoul of the casual world. Policy was recorded in one week in Jimi Hendrix's old living room (upstairs at Electric Lady Studios). Jeremy Gara played drums; other musicians contributed woodwinds and backing vocals. Most everything else was played by Will. The song structures are traditional; the arrangements are clean. The music is experimental only in that it attacks consistency as a requirement for sincerity. The songs are angry, loving, joking, tired, honest, idiotic. They clash against each other but also fit and work together as if a blind watchmaker made a Frankenstein watch that came alive and told extremely accurate time while having conflicting feelings about its creator. No, about creation itself. But then the watch makes friends with a talking rat, and they go on hilarious adventures until it turns out that the rat was dead the whole time. With a really good credits song I mean, the whole soundtrack is excellent. You should check it out. Yours truly, Memphis Slim Blues Musician."

Watch a clip of him performing "Take My Side" at a recent show in NYC.

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