After twenty years of musical partnership, Automatic finds Jeremiah Fraites and Wesley Schultz traveling new sonic and thematic terrain with their most raw and personal collection thus far. Thrilled at breaking new songwriting ground, Fraites and Schultz reached out to Woodstock, NY-based producer/songwriter/ keyboardist David Baron who outfitted Woodstock’s Utopia studio like the legendary Abbey Road facility, installing both vintage and cutting-edge gear. In a capacious “live room,” the musicians could perform songs as a unit, leaving fewer opportunities to fix mistakes, or refine the sound. While songs reveal a risky intimacy and heretofore untapped undercurrent of humor, Automatic remains very much what fans around the world have come to love about The Lumineers – shadowy themes wrapped in upbeat, infectious melodies, sky-high choruses destined to be sung by thousands, and what Fraites calls “a palpable sense of connection between Wes and me. There’s lots of love on this record. I can’t wait to tour behind it.”
