Red Sky July release new single - Stars Turn Cold

Red Sky July release ‘Stars Turn Cold’ – third single from forthcoming 2025 album

Single available to stream/download on January 24^th

Album released February 28^th 2025

Watch the video via YouTube

“Timeless and permanent… Sumptuous guitar and peerless songwriting.”

– 4* album review, MOJO Magazine

Listen/buy here: https://slinky.to/StarsTurnCold

www.redskyjuly.com

January 24th, 2024 – Red Sky July have released their new single, ‘Stars Turn Cold’ today, with a video available to watch now via YouTube. This is the third song to be released from their upcoming album ‘Misty Morning’ (due for release February 28^th 2025) and comes hot on the heels of the announcement of their 2025 tour, which sees the band play 10 dates in England and Scotland through February and March 2025 (dates below).

The new single encapsulates the evolved sound of the upcoming album, and was the initial track and stylistic reference point for the music, as Shelly explains, “‘Stars Turn Cold’ was the first song that arrived to us for the Misty Morning album, and from this song we wrote outwards to find brothers and sisters for her. We knew this song was the centre point for the new album instrumentation wise and tone wise and this is why the whole album exists. The song was written quickly in the lounge of our home on an acoustic guitar, I hummed the first melody that came to mind and that is where it stayed. She was an easy one.”

‘A collection of elegant Americana… with a pronounced pop sheen’

– 4* album review, Record Collector magazine

Early support for the record has already come from the likes of Mark Radcliffe on BBC Radio 2’s Folk show, BBC Scotland (“Red Sky July are sounding very good indeed” – Ricky Ross), BBC Radio Wales (“A delight” – Frank Hennessy), BBC Radio Ulster (“I’m quite taken by them…just gorgeous” – Eve Blair), and more.

15 years since the band formed and eight since their last, lauded album, Red Sky July have returned with a folkier fresh direction since the arrival of singer Haley Glennie-Smith, known for her work on soundtracks including Stephen Woolley’s Stoned, Todd Haynes’ I’m Not There and Alfonso Cuarón’s Gravity and as the solo vocalist of Planet Earth in Concert.

“Our aim was to shake up the perception of what folk music means,” says Shelly. “When recording the new album we challenged the instrumentation involved in the folk and Americana genres and used a lot of delays and electronic drones to create a much more cinematic sound. We also layered up some ‘found sound’ that we recorded in Scotland, Ireland, America, Spain and everywhere else on our travels. We made synth drones out of them, which became the bedrock of the album, sound-wise.”

Having first found global fame in the ‘90s with her sister in Alisha’s Attic – the platinum-sellers toured with INXS and Bon Jovi and were mainstays of the Lilith Fair movement promoting women in pop – Shelly went on to work with Janet Jackson, Westlife, Mark Ronson and Massive Attack. She is one of Britan’s most in-demand songwriters for other artists as well as film and TV soundtracks.

I just think they’re wonderful – Baylen Leonard, Absolute Radio Country

Just exquisite! – Bernie Keith, BBC Radio Nottinghamshire

Red Sky July’s first three albums were fronted by Charity Hair, whose Southern States twang and fiddle playing gave the group a distinct country sound. When she left pre-pandemic to return to the States, Shelly looked up her old friend Haley and discovered that she lived just up the road.

“I hadn’t seen her in over a decade, but I still had her number and, incredibly, it still worked,” laughs Shelly. “She could have been anywhere in the world, but she was living ten minutes from us in North London. We met up the same day and she agreed to join the band. It couldn’t have been more serendipitous.”

What appeared to be easy took a tricky turn when the trio scrapped their first album and then the pandemic hit. “Actually we scrapped two albums,” says Ally. “The second written in lockdown. I think we were trying too hard. I had been due out on Texas’ 30^th anniversary tour, but twice it was cancelled. Everything was up in the air and perhaps we felt under pressure to write.”

Third time around, things flowed. “Once we decided to have no rules and no boundaries, we found our new sound,” says Shelly. “Ally and I are so used to working to strict remits on soundtracks and adverts. We had to ditch that mentality and just go with our guts.

“What we hit on as a trio feels so special. There are bits of all our backgrounds, melded together, but with more electronics than we’ve used in the past. It’s organic and different, and it sums up our past few years. It’s been a long time coming, but worth the wait.”

2025 TOUR DATES

27 FEBRUARY | LIVERPOOL, PROHIBITION STUDIOS

28 FEBRUARY | GLASGOW, GLAD CAFE LOW TICKETS REMAINING

08 MARCH | BRIGHTON, THE FOLKLORE ROOMS LOW TICKETS REMAINING

19 MARCH | SHEFFIELD, THE GREYSTONES

20 – 22 MARCH | MANCHESTER FOLK FESTIVAL

20 MARCH | TYNEMOUTH, ALFIE & FIN’S

21 MARCH | BEVERLEY, ST. NICHOLAS CHURCH

22 MARCH | MANCHESTER, HALLE ST. PETER’S

26 MARCH | PUTNEY, HALF MOON

27 MARCH | BIRMINGHAM, KITCHEN GARDEN CAFÉ

Previous acclaim for Red Sky July includes: