James Place: Sadie’s Tears
In his debut album Living On Superstition, NYC native Phil Tortoroli (under the alter ego James Place) reflects upon his self-ambiguity and anxious demons after a breakup with his longtime girlfriend and quitting his full-time corporate gig. The track “Sadie’s Tears” in particular was finished after one memorable fight where his girlfriend’s cat Sadie kept shrilly meowing for food in the background. “At the time, it was the worst sound I could hear given the circumstances. I named the song after her crying because it was on a surface level, a sad song, but a step below, a need for basic nourishment: in Sadie’s case, food; in my case, a loving partner,” Tortoroli tells CH. The music video features Tortoroli’s father, haunted by a “specter of anxiety”; the instrumental track manages to paradoxically tranquilize and stimulate at the same time, and comes to an end much too soon.
