Matador Records has released the Jim-E Stack remix of Perfume Genius’ ‘Without You,’ which is taken from his critically acclaimed album Set My Heart On Fire Immediately.
Stack had previously collaborated with Perfume Genius and Empress Of on the single ‘When I’m With Him,’ and has also worked with artists such as Bon Iver, Caroline Polachek, Haim and more.
Stack said of the ‘Without You’ remix, “to my ears a Perfume Genius album always embodies excellence, from the song-writing to the production to the mixing. Every word, note, and sound feels so purposeful while playing its role in each song and in the greater context of the album. I chose to remix ‘Without You,’ because something about it felt timeless and familiar but also grounded and confident. That gave me room to make a completely new instrumental around the vocal.” He went on to say, “even though Mike and I are friends and we’ve worked together in the past, I was admittedly intimidated by the task of remixing ‘Without You.’ Once I found a way to bring the song into my world, I started listening to the remix outside the studio and I knew I had done my thing. I just hoped Mike would want to listen to it too.”
In the last few months, Hadreas has appeared on JIMMY KIMMEL LIVE!, played a global live stream from The Palace Theater in downtown Los Angeles and announced the publication of Immediately, the book companion to the new album featuring iconic portraits of Perfume Genius by celebrated French photographer Camille Vivier. Perfume Genius has also appeared on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert performing “Whole Life” for their #PlayAtHome series and on Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon where he performed “On The Floor” and “Jason.”
Called one of the best albums of 2020 by the New York Times, NPR, Time Magazine, Stereogum, Uproxx, Paste, Consequence of Sound and more, Perfume Genius released his latest album, Set My Heart On Fire Immediately on Matador Records to worldwide critical acclaim this past May. The album was produced by GRAMMY-winning producer Blake Mills and features contributions from musicians Jim Keltner, Pino Palladino, Matt Chamberlin and Rob Moose. It was recorded in Los Angeles, where Perfume Genius settled in 2017 with longtime partner and musical collaborator Alan Wyffels. The album explores and subverts concepts of masculinity and traditional roles, and introduces decidedly American musical influences.
ACCLAIM FOR SET MY HEART ON FIRE IMMEDIATELY:
“Mike Hadreas’ fifth album glides between sublime melodies and grimy, guttural dissonance, embracing the joys and burdens of the human body and its innumerable, intangible yearnings.” Pitchfork 9.0 “Best New Music”
“The sturdy structures of pop only go so far in Perfume Genius songs. They provide reassurance that others have found ways to capture similar feelings. But they can’t hold back the immediacy of longing, the all-consuming physical need. ” The New York Times
“Hadreas the performer emerged in full technicolor, standing front and center as the defiant face of his, now decade-long, musical project.” Vogue
“’Describe” features a gloriously fuzzed-out guitar tone and Hadreas’ lovely, ethereal voice.” NPR
“a pop-perfect two and a half minutes.” Rolling Stone on “‘Describe”
“If the early albums were coming-of-age records, this is Perfume Genius, of age. The music isn’t any one thing. It’s everything, occasionally at once, playing with the ideas of hard and soft, innocence and danger, chaos and control, vastness and intimacy, leather and lace. The characteristic — thrilling — strangeness remains, particularly when Hadreas indulges the deeper registers of his singing voice.” New York Times
“‘Describe’ is Perfume Genius at their finest as Mike Hadreas takes us through a trip of multiple dimensions, unveils a screeching guitar and unleashes a heavy rhythm section on this ‘90s rock-feeling single” Billboard
“a bouncy bop of a tune” Time (5 Best New Songs of the Week) on “On The Floor”
“it is grandiose and beautiful.” Fader on “‘Describe”
AN IMPRESSION OF PERFUME GENIUS’ SET MY HEART ON FIRE IMMEDIATELY
By Ocean Vuong
Can disruption be beautiful? Can it, through new ways of embodying joy and power, become a way of thinking and living in a world burning at the edges? Hearing Perfume Genius, one realizes that the answer is not only yes—but that it arrived years ago, when Mike Hadreas, at age 26, decided to take his life and art in to his own hands, his own mouth. In doing so, he recast what we understand as music into a weather of feeling and thinking, one where the body (queer, healing, troubled, wounded, possible and gorgeous) sings itself into its future. When listening to Perfume Genius, a powerful joy courses through me because I know the context of its arrival—the costs are right there in the lyrics, in the velvet and smoky bass and synth that verge on synesthesia, the scores at times a violet and tender heat in the ear. That the songs are made resonant through the body’s triumph is a truth this album makes palpable. As a queer artist, this truth nourishes me, inspires me anew. This is music to both fight and make love to. To be shattered and whole with. If sound is, after all, a negotiation/disruption of time, then in the soft storm of Set My Heart On Fire Immediately, the future is here. Because it was always here. Welcome home.
—Ocean Vuong, author of On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous
More About Perfume Genius
Hadreas grew up in Seattle, WA and started his music career in 2008. He released his debut album Learning in 2010 via long-time label home Matador, and it instantly caught the attention of critics. “The songs on Hadreas’ full-length debut are eviscerating and naked,” said Pitchfork, “with heartbreaking sentiments and bruised characterizations delivered in a voice that ranges from an ethereal croon to a slightly cracked warble.” These descriptors became the hallmarks of Perfume Genius – Hadreas’ unique ability to convey emotional vulnerability not only lyrically, but with his impressively nuanced vocals.
His following album, Put Your Back N 2 It was released in 2012 and continued to build both his audience and critical acclaim. 2014’s Too Bright, exhibited a massive leap forward in both production and confidence. Co-produced by Adrian Utley of Portishead the album featured the stand-out single, ‘Queen’. The track quickly became a queer anthem and a powerful statement of being. Hadreas performed the song on Late Night with David Letterman.
In 2017, Perfume Genius released the GRAMMY-nominated No Shape, an album that would crystalize his fanbase world-wide and bring mainstream awareness to his art. The record was produced by Blake Mills (Fiona Apple, Alabama Shakes). “If you listen to the four Perfume Genius albums in chronological order, you can hear Hadreas healing himself in real time, moving toward an emancipation that seems, suddenly, to have come to pass,” said The New Yorker. “The center of his music has always been a defiant delicacy- a ragged, affirmative understanding of despair. ‘No Shape’ finds him unexpectedly victorious, his body exalted.” Over the course of the campaign he appeared on multiple late-night television shows and graced the cover of The Fader.
Perfume Genius’ music has played a central role in a number of films and television including The Goldfinch, The Society, 13 Reasons Why, Booksmart and Eighth Grade. He has collaborated with artists including Christine And The Queens, Sharon Van Etten, Weyes Blood, Cate Le Bon, Anna Calvi, King Princess and more. Hadreas has also collaborated with brands like Prada and W Hotels on special projects. His albums have been nominated for a GRAMMY Award and a GLAAD Media Award and have topped numerous Decade-end lists including Billboard’s, Pitchfork’s, Crack’s, Paste’s and more.
