Info

Tracklist:
1. The Cotton Mather Pledge
2. Fighting Through
3. High Society
4. Hijinks Dad
5. Better Than A Hit
6. King William
7. California
8. Girl With A Blue Guitar
9. It’s Better Not To Be The King
10. The Army
11. I Volunteer

It took 15 years for Cotton Mather to return with 2016’s Death Of The Cool, the first collection of
songs compiled from band leader robert harrison’s ambitious, possibly impossible aim to write 64
songs, one for each hexagram of the I Ching, the ancient text which he refers to as an “extraordinary
book about ordinary life.”

Now, Cotton Mather will release Wild Kingdom on April 7th, 2017. The album brings together
another 11 tracks, following up the 11-song death of the cool, and the three-track “Cotton Mather
With Nicole Atkins EP.” to date, 30 of the “songs from the i ching” have been released.

“Wild Kingdom is more a change of season than scenery,” Harrison states. “While i was writing the
first half of the I Ching project, i tended to circle the songs with a requisite richness and gravity
because i thought it important to do something for the first release in fifteen years. Otherwise,
what’s the point ‘relatively obscure indie cult band reunites to demonstrate that maybe going
away the first time was just a fine idea?’ uh, no thank you. You have to get better!”

Cotton Mather fans at SXSW 2017 can judge for themselves ahead of the album’s national release.
Wild kingdom will be available exclusively through adored austin record store waterloo records
for one month prior to the rest of the world, coinciding with SXSW and Cotton Mather’s performance
supporting spoon on march 15th as part of that band’s three-night festival residency.

“Kontiki gave me something to shoot for,” Spoon leader Britt Daniel once said of cotton mather’s
1997 underground classic album. In addition to praise from musicians, the record was especially
loved by the UK press, with both Uncut and The Guardian awarding it five-star ratings. Like the
instantly memorable pop songs that made (and make) Kontiki influential – a two-disc reissue
released in 2012 received similar praise all over again, and Kontiki was also finally released on vinyl
at the end of 2016 – Wild Kingdom continues in the Robert Harrison tradition of impeccable song
craft that doesn’t ever let up on the hooks, or the winking.