For Those I Love shares new song and visual essay

Single release: Out now
Label: September Recordings
More info: For Those I Love’s website

“Top Scheme”

READ THE FADER’S PREMIERE HERE
WATCH: https://forthoseilove.ffm.to/topschemevideo
LISTEN: https://forthoseilove.ffm.to/topscheme

For Those I Love early praise:

“His debut single I Have a Love, a tribute to a dead friend, is reminiscent of the Streets’ night bus poetry, and tracks from an album later in the year nod to other moodily rave-adjacent artists such as Massive Attack, Mount Kimbie and Burial.” – The Guardian

“For Those I Love fights for the underdog… raw and uncompromising electronic music that taps into both deeply personal trauma and wider societal ills for influence.” – The FADER

“‘I Have A Love’, the introduction from producer, multi-instrumentalist and visual artist David Balfe, is an undeniably stark and searing piece that is not only informed but ultimately catalysed by agony and deliverance.” – So Young

‘I Have A Love’ included in Tracks of the Week – Pitchfork

Today, Irish songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and visual artist For Those I Love, born David Balfe, shares a new song and video. Self-directed by Balfe, “Top Scheme” is a powerful and poignant visual essay that uninhibitedly tackles various social issues in Ireland, such as sexism, classism, and the prison industrial complex. The song follows For Those I Love’s debut single “I Have a Love,” which also arrived alongside a moving, self-directed video

Dave first began work on the project as a chance to write frankly about the struggles he and his friends faced while growing up in north Dublin. Anecdotally and otherwise, For Those I Love documents the harsh realities of a daily life up against it, and holds a mirror up to the clear disparity between a working class upbringing and the lack of opportunity that remains to this day.

At its core, the forthcoming album pays tribute to Dave’s best friend and former bandmate, Paul Curran, who passed away in 2018. Following Paul’s tragic death, Dave locked himself away in his home studio for months, ultimately recording over 76 songs that would eventually be condensed down to form the basis of his debut album. The result is an incredibly beautiful, raw and uncompromising 9-track project addressing grief and catharsis, an important record that could only emerge from an entirely honest place. 

The first single from that album, “I Have a Love,” followed closely after the release of mix, Into A World That Doesn’t Understand It, Unless You’re From It, which showcased unreleased tracks, ideas and demos that didn’t fit onto the album and sold out of its limited tape run in only hours.

The self-titled debut album from For Those I Love will arrive early next year on September Recordings.

Listen to and watch “Top Scheme” above and stay tuned for more from For Those I Love coming soon.

On ‘Top Scheme’, Dave said:

“I wrote Top Scheme to directly spit in the face of the state, the banks, and those that continue to socially cripple the less fortunate without ever looking at the world we have been forced to live and grow within. It sits within a wider group of songs that look at the social alienation of the working class and how that continues to haunt us as we grow older.”