While some album features feel shoehorned in or otherwise meant to up the artist’s clout, the forthcoming fourth album from Boy Golden only includes one guest with whom he collaborates on two songs: Canadian alt-country songwriter Cat Clyde, whose keyed-in harmonies elevate both tracks to new indie-folk heights. To hear Boy Golden’s Liam Duncan explain it, Clyde brought much more than just her voice to Best of Our Possible Lives, as she helped unlock Duncan’s full songwriting potential on this latest venture. “Everyone you meet is a mirror, showing you some part of yourself,” he shares. “Cat shows me a part of myself that I really like: a more free, more creative, bolder version of myself.”
Clyde appears on one of the album’s highlights, “Cowboy Dreams,” which is being shared today. The sensual rocker could only exist as a duet, with Duncan and Clyde’s vocals climbing over each other every time the clanging guitar riff subsides to the singers’ personifications of love. “Sewing this song together with Boy Golden was so much fun,” Clyde shares. “During one of our collaborative sessions he brought this to the table, with a substantial amount of lyrics. It felt excitingly obvious to me which lines felt really strong and in what order they were asking to fall to tell a cohesive and complete story. The groove of the demo was really inspiring to me and the harmony I created felt like I was singing my own version of the song alongside him.”
Both artists appear in the song’s equestrian video, which pays homage to a certain 1986 pop-R&B classic. “The video for ‘Cowboy Dreams’ is inspired by a music video Sade made, where she’s riding a galloping horse, and it rules,” Boy Golden shares, referring to the iconic “Never As Good As the First Time” visual. “I spent a month taking riding lessons, and I’m so glad I did!”
Check out the video below, and pre-order Best of Our Possible Lives here ahead of its February 13 release.
