SOAK: NPR Music Tiny Desk Concert

The opening line of SOAK's debut album — "A teenage heart is an unguided dart" — contains the first words I heard from 19-year-old singer-songwriter Bridie Monds-Watson. Now, she's bringing that fragile, pure, thickly Irish-accented voice to the Tiny Desk.

Before We Forgot How To Dream, SOAK's debut, is one of my favorite albums of 2015. Monds-Watson's songs are about growing up and trying to understand adults and friends and life; though they're quiet, they aren't dour. They can be funny and smart, atmospheric and delicate — so much more than might be expected from a lone Irish teenager with an acoustic guitar.

- Bob Boilen, US National Public Radio


Set List
"Sea Creatures" 00:00
"B a noBody" 03:29
"Wait" 09:13

SOAK, guest DJ on NPR's All Songs Considered

http://www.npr.org/sections/allsongs/2015/07/14/422867822/guest-dj-soak

Before We Forgot How to Dream is one of my favorite albums of 2015. It's by an artist you may not yet know, but I'm hoping you'll fall in love with her. Her name is Bridie Monds-Watson, better known as SOAK.

Bridie is nineteen years old now, but she was fourteen when she wrote some of the music on her new record, including the standout cut "Sea Creatures." The songs on Before We Forgot How To Dream are atmospheric and delicate. It's a much more complex sound than what I expected from an Irish teenager with an acoustic guitar.

I asked Bridie Monds-Watson to play DJ on this edition of All Songs Considered, and share some of the songs she loves by other artists who've influenced her over the years. It turns out she's a huge Pink Floyd fan, with a special fondness for R.E.M. and Bon Iver. We also play and talk about some of my favorite songs from SOAK's new record.

You can hear and download the full conversation with the link above, or scan a playlist of the songs we play in the episode, alongside personal stories from SOAK about each of them.

- Bob Boilen
July 14 2015