Bodies of water have long been a theme in Zach Hurd’s work under the Bay Ledges moniker, from the the name he performs under to the title of his newly released second album, Rivers. Across that most recent project, he manages to tie this theme into more personal subject matter regarding love and loss, with beachside lazing and canopies of trees helping to set a natural scene for these 10 tracks of contemplative mourning.
Naturally, then, for his “Neighborhoods” set Hurd opted to perform the album track “Setting Free” with a nearby body of water as a backdrop—and not just any body of water, but specifically a bay (well, at least an ocean adjacent to a bay) which he walks toward while beginning to strum through the song on acoustic guitar before stopping on, you guessed it, a ledge. “I feel like it can sit well as a stripped-down acoustic piece while some of the other songs on the album need a bit more instrumentation to shine through,” he shares on his song selection. “I just moved to Berkeley, and water has always felt like a recurring theme in my music, so Lands End in San Francisco seemed like a fun place to try and capture a performance.”
Check out his performance in San Francisco’s Lands End park overlooking the Golden Gate strait below, and listen to Rivers here.
