My Friends Were Here by Birthday Dad + A Place for Owls

My Friends Were Here

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Birthday Dad is the twinkly emo pop project of Alex Periera. His forebears include songwriters like Conor Oberst (Bright Eyes, Desaparecidos, Better Oblivion Community Center) and Jake Ewald (Modern Baseball; Slaughter Beach, Dog), and Periera doesn’t just inhabit the niche these artists have established between folk, emo, and indie rock, he refines and invigorates it. Despite being a solo act (albeit with a wonderful rotation of guest contributors), his work as a musician is driven by a desire for collective solace and a shared sense of resonance, not unlike that of A Place For Owls. Starting shortly before the COVID-19 pandemic, much of Periera’s songwriting under the Birthday Dad moniker—particularly his 2022 debut LP The Hermit, a collection of introspective, homespun meditations of solitude—has been an attempt to find connection through isolation, a shout into the void. And sometimes, if you’re lucky, someone from out in the void shouts back. A Place For Owls are a band that bravely begs the question: what if five dudes made sincere, insightful emo-indebted music that puts the “heart” in heartland rock, and were also best friends? When it comes to their process, community and creativity go hand-in-hand. At the heart of every Owls project is an undying love for each other and for the music that brings them together. They’re a band whose collaborative spirit shines through everything they do, whose songs are forged by friendship. A Place For Owls’ music is an outlet for vulnerability, catharsis, and an escape from the nagging anxieties of everyday life—for the band as well as their devoted fanbase. Mainstays of their local scene in Denver, A Place For Owls embody DIY principles and processes on every level, using their sweet riffs and down-to-earth lyricism to build genuine, heartfelt connections with fans near and far. Hailing from Colorado and California respectively, A Place For Owls and Birthday Dad have been longtime fans of each other’s work, and what better way to celebrate their mutual admiration than with a split EP that offers the perfect sample of both bands’ stylings? This EP, fittingly titled My Friends Were Here, features two original compositions and two covers. Birthday Dad kicks it off with “I Heard This Song In A Dream,” a metanarrative track about the mercurial nature of the songwriting process, whose sonic aesthetic Pereira has described as “nightmare-Sesame Street.” A Place For Owls volley back with “Cigarettes & Coffee Stains,” an ode to the punk house where frontman Ben Sooy lived after dropping out of college and all the mess, noise, and love that filled his time there. On the back half of My Friends Were Here, each band pays tribute to their collaborator through a cover that maintains the spirit of the original while imbuing it with a new sound and a new perspective. A Place For Owls rework the angsty-catchy “TV Dinner”—a Birthday Dad favorite—by infusing it with the pop-rock fuzz of Pinkerton-era Weezer. Meanwhile Birthday Dad’s spin on “Do I Feel At Home Here?” brings Owls’ heartfelt rocker into the ongoing narrative of The Hermit and the lineage of Periera’s musical influences. Like a shared scrapbook or a collection of letters between pen pals, My Friends Were Here is a beautiful expression of Birthday Dad and A Place For Owls’ reverence for one another, and a testament to how they enrich each other’s artistry. It’s a celebration of what can happen when artists who are excellent in their own right come together to honor one another’s work—and have lots of fun doing so. - Grace Robins-Somerville… Expand

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