Kurt Vile And The Violators - Twisted Teens

Kurt Vile And The Violators - Twisted Teens

Lincoln Drive is a four-mile stretch of highway in Philadelphia that seems to exist out of time, its

winding turns taking you by cinematic river bends, dense woods, and inns and roadhouses that

date back to the 1800s. Once used as a pleasure roadway for early motorists, it’s now the route

Kurt Vile takes from his home in the city’s leafy Mt. Airy neighborhood to cruise into Philly

proper.

“Jump in my whip / My engine whines / Zigzag my way / Down Lincoln Drive / Puck on

my lip, feel I can fly / For a while,

” he sings on “Zoom 97,

” the opening track on his tenth

full-length record, Philadelphia’s been good to me (Verve Records). As Gold Tone mandolins

swirl and dubby effects bubble around his vocals, an image of Vile driving with the window

down, his signature shaggy mane rippling in the wind, begins to cohere.

“My Philly is deceptively simple in a lot of ways,

” says Vile, ever a zenned-out philosopher of the

quotidian.

“It's about driving back and forth from Mt. Airy to North Liberties, where my career

started. There’s so many ghosts I can visit there—all friendly ghosts, really.

”

Released in God’s year of 2026, the 250th anniversary of the founding of America in Kurt Vile’s

fine city, Philadelphia’s been good to me enjoys a similar time-collapsing quality, merging

meandering balladry and horizon-chasing road songs with lines about “too many screens” and

how “it was 2012 but it felt like 2014.

” Philadelphia isn’t exactly Neil Young’s Malibu, California

or Terry Allen’s Lubbock, Texas. But every great American songwriter needs to stake a claim for

the town that feels most like home, and with this album, the man who came out of the gate

calling himself “Philly’s constant hitmaker” has crafted a love letter to the city he never left, even

as his career took him around the world.

“This is my ‘bringing it all back home to Philly’ album,

” Vile says.

“I’m treating it like my last. I put

everything into it. It’s my best vocal record. It’s my best electric guitar record. It’s my most

organic record, made in the comfort of my own zone.

”

He created the album from late 2023 to early 2026, in what he describes as “an inspired state of

flux,

” capturing the odd melody on a Zoom recorder or loop machine between stints on the road.

Though Vile’s travels led him to sessions in Memphis, Los Angeles, and Athens (Georgia, that

is), he laid down the majority of the album in a basement studio in his Mt. Airy home,

surrounded by humming analog organs, old tape consoles, records, and books about heroes

like Young, Allen, John Prine, and Sun Ra—some of whom he now counts as collaborators.

Built out with Violators bassist Adam Langellotti at the start of the pandemic, the space, dubbed

“OKV Central” (for “Overnite KV”), has become Vile’s sanctuary, a place he can retreat to after a

show in the city and receive a visit from the late-night muse.

“I’ll come back, high on music and life, inspired by friendships and all the laughter and jokes I

had that night,

” he says.

“And I look around and see my studio in a new light. I just turn on a

synth and a looper, strap on a guitar, and I put that beautiful night into some kind of song. This

album captures all that, ya know?”

Largely self-produced, with assists from Langellotti, keys wiz Matthew Jugenheimer, drummer

Kyle Spence, guitarist Jesse Trbovrich, and longtime Violators boardsman Rob Schnapf, the

record sees Vile returning to his home-recording roots while also coming into his own as a

producer, using time-tested and world-worn tools to fill the album with more warmth and

bonhomie than you can fit into the back of a touring band’s van.

“I’ve been waiting for that kinda

natural element to show up again in my recordings, like the old home recording days,

” he says.

“I think I finally caught that again, but in a higher fidelity; it’s never overly polished, but it’s still

pretty damn shimmery.

” He’s especially proud of the sparkly lead guitar melodies he pulls from

an old, hollow-body Gretsch Tennessean once owned by longtime friend and “one of my true

heroes,

” Travis Good of the Sadies.

“It was shredded on for so long by one of the greatest guitar

players in the world,

” Vile says.

“That guitar pretty much plays itself every time I pick it up

because of where it came from.

”

Though it’s a snapshot of his life at a particular moment in time, Philadelphia’s been good to me

embodies Vile’s understanding of music as a conversation between people across time.

Hometown ode that it might be, the title track—featuring a tribute to his city’s notoriously hard to

spell (for outsiders, at least) Schuylkill River—is a riff on Tom Petty’s “California.

” It might be

“polluted as hell,

” Vile sings.

“But it runs through my town and I ain’t puttin’ it down.

” Similarly,

the photo on the album’s cover, an image of a ramshackle bar sign taken by the legendary

photographer William Eggleston, actually depicts a scene in Memphis. Yet the

never-before-seen original photo, which Eggleston’s son Winston sent to Kurt a few years ago,

is as much a part of his history in the city as his old gig driving a forklift at the Philadelphia

Brewing Company or his old haunts in Northern Liberties. Its origin is both immaterial and the

key that unlocks its meaning.

Elsewhere, on “Chance to Bleed,

” Vile looks back on his early days in the underground music

scene. Featuring guest vocals from two OG Memphis scene greats—Natalie Hoffman of NOTS

and Optic Sink and Greg Cartwright of Reining Sound and the Oblivians, who also contributes

co-lead guitar (Kurt’s guitar is panned to the left, Greg’s to the right) —it’s an ode to “old-time,

lo-fi, DIY rock ‘n’ roll nights.

” It’s a catchy-as-hell barnburner he calls “hillbilly techno,

” and

appropriately, its music video was filmed at Fishtown institution Kung Fu Necktie, packed out

with friends and collaborators. It even boasts a cameo from a fellow hometown hero: the one

and only Schoolly D, popping up in his signature fur coat.

“Rock O’ Stone” lyrically references the music of legendary Texas hip-hop producer DJ Screw,

and there’s a distinct country influence on “Every Time I Look at You,

” which features sly

spoken-word verses reminiscent of Allen and fingerpicking in the vein of the dearly departed

John Prine.

“It’s got the ’isms of the country greats,

” Vile says. Meanwhile,

“You Don’t Know Cuz

It’s My Life” is his take on a stadium anthem. It builds up to a laid-back yet triumphant chant of

“I’m from Phil-a-del-phiaaaaaah!” that you could imagine a crowd of Eagles fans singing at

halftime, with the occasional affectionate kiss-off to the transplants who’ve left the city behind.

Finally,

“Avalanches of Snow”

—featuring Vile on a trumpet he’s had since middle school and a

particular guitar outro moment from Trbovrich that Vile calls “his most beauteous contribution as

a Violator”

—transforms a mundane experience of shoveling snow on Christmas eve into a deep,

mysterious journey to the end of the night.

Make no mistake: Philadelphia’s been good to me is the sound of Philly’s constant hitmaker

coming back to kick ass, son the haters, and put on for the City of Brotherly Love. In true Kurt

Vile fashion, he does so while sounding more relaxed than ever. Between the 250th anniversary

of America and its hosting of select World Cup games, 2026 is shaping up to be a big deal for

Philadelphia.

“And then there’s one other thing,

” Vile says.

“I gotta be that third thing. Because I

am Philadelphia. I gotta own it. I gotta rise to the occasion.

”

SHORT VERSION:

Released in God’s year of 2026, the 250th anniversary of the founding of America in Kurt Vile’s

fine city of Philadelphia, Philadelphia’s been good to me finds one of our nation’s greatest

songwriters staking a claim on his hometown.

“This is my ‘bringing it all back home to Philly’

record,

” Vile says.

“I’m treating it like my last one. I put everything into it. It’s my best vocal

record. It’s my best electric guitar record. It’s my most organic record, made in the comfort of my

”

own zone.

Largely self-produced, with assists from Adam Langellotti, keys wiz Matthew Jugenheimer,

drummer Kyle Spence, guitarist Jesse Trbovrich, and longtime Violators boardsman Rob

Schnapf, the record embodies Vile’s understanding of music as a conversation between people

across time and space. The title track is an ode to his hometown that doubles as an homage to

Tom Petty’s homage to California. The barn-burning “Chance to Bleed” features guest spots

from Memphis OGs Natalie Hoffman and Greg Cartwright but boasts a music video proudly shot

at the Philly venue Kung Fu Necktime and features a cameo by local legend Schoolly D.

“You

Don’t Know Cuz It’s My Life” is Kurt’s take on a stadium anthem, building up to a laid-back yet

triumphant chant of “I’m from Phil-a-del-phiaaaaaaah!” that you can imagine a crowd of Eagles

fans screaming along to, Twisted Teas pointed towards the heavens.

Make no mistake: Philadelphia’s been good to me is the sound of Philly’s constant hitmaker

coming back to kick ass, son the haters, and put on for the City of Brotherly Love — and in true

Kurt Vile fashion, doing so while sounding more relaxed than ever. Between the 250th

anniversary of America and its hosting of select World Cup games, 2026 is shaping up to be a

big deal for Philadelphia.

“And then there’s one other thing,

” Vile says.

“I gotta be that third

thing. Because I am Philadelphia. I gotta own it. I gotta rise to the occasion.

”