The City on Film - solo project from Braid's Bob Nanna

Album release: "La Vella" by The City On Film (Bob Nanna)
Release date: 16 January 2015
Label: Topshelf
More information: on Topshelf website

Topshelf Records and Braid's Bob Nanna are proud to announce the new album from The City On Film, Nanna’s solo side project, titled "La Vella". Set for a 16 January 2015 release date, La Vella was produced by Nanna and Jeff Dean at Million Yen in Chicago, IL, and follows the release of Braid’s critically acclaimed return, No Coast, that was released in July of 2014. The album’s first track, “You Wild Thing (An Illuminous Life),” can now be streamed via Brooklyn Vegan HERE and the album can be pre-ordered through the Topshelf Records website HERE.

In January 2014, Bob Nanna was laid off from what he described as the “perfect day job.” Undeterred, he began to create a new perfect day job, playing music (with seminal emo band, Braid, a young frenetic upstart, Lifted Bells, and the downtempo electronic band with his wife named Jack & Ace). He also focused attention on his custom songwriting website, Downwrite.com, which fueled the inspiration for this newest album from his solo project The City On Film, entitled La Vella.

On Downwrite, Nanna sourced stories from nine fans and turned them into tracks on this new album, the second full-length solo record after 2007’s In Formal Introduction. Lead off track “You Wild Thing (An Illuminous Life)” tells of a chance meeting and a bonding over The Pogues, Ted Leo, and gym shoes. “Take The Ghosts” addresses personal conflict after a tragedy while “Stray” takes on wanderlust in the Big Apple. Nanna used a request for a soundtrack to a charity bike trek to create “Kill It!,” a song about a close-to-home battle with lymphoma. The album concludes with “Andorra La Vella,” the most personal song on the record, written independently of Downwrite, recalling a big red dictionary in the Nanna household, highlighting countries and capitals, and a few poignant songs he cannot listen to anymore.

The City on Film, as solo vehicle, debuted in 1999 during a Braid hiatus and has been active, albeit in the background, since. Given the success of his various musical projects and Downwrite, Nanna hopes to keep The City On Film forever alive to tell his stories and the stories of his friends and fans.