A few weeks ago, Annie Hardy, of the long-running LA-based indie rock project Giant Drag, faked her own death as a dark online hoax. At the time, she wrote, "I thought if only for a second we could all shift dimensional realities together and maybe find new appreciation for one another." Earlier this week, Hardy, who is still alive, released a new Giant Drag single that's naturally called "Song For My Funeral."
Hardy says that she wrote "Song For My Funeral" several years ago, "after finally skimming the lengthy DM’s one of my schizophrenic stalkers had sent me seeing it end with 'I’m a father and a husband which makes it even more upsetting I should have to die. Well, leaving Monday. See you soon'." She wrote the song as a way to cope with how freaked-out that DM left her, and her original idea was to record the song with an orchestra. But after multiple attempts, the one that she's releasing is a spare, idiosyncratic, wordplay-heavy solo-acoustic number that goes on for a surprisingly long time and has echoes of the Moldy Peaches and maybe Daniel Johnston.
"Song For My Funeral" will appear on a forthcoming Giant Drag record that's produced by the former Icarus Line member Joe Cardamone. Cardomone also directed the song's black-and-white video, in which Hardy dramatically arm-wrestles a whole series of opponents, including the former MTV VJ Jesse Camp. I wish these folks would be more diligent about keeping their elbows on the table, but maybe that's not the point. Watch it below.