Keep Your Friends Close: Happy 10 Year Anniversary TODAY. Head to KEEPYOURFRIENDSCLOSETHEALBUM.COM to be a part of the upcoming digital memory magazine I'm putting together in collaboration with my fans.
Letter below 🧡
Dear friends of mine,
It’s crazy to think that for over 10 years I’ve been writing you letters like this one. Today is the 10 year anniversary of my project Keep Your Friends Close. Much love from now til eternity.
This week didn’t go as planned for anyone in my family with my grandma passing away. But yesterday I carried her casket with my brothers after saying our last goodbyes, and the church blew bagpipes. Today we have to march on. Because of the circumstances, I’m pivoting to no longer make today the big day — but instead to make the entire next month a FULL MONTH of Keep Your Friends Close the album through the end of January and February. So today is not the end of our celebration but the beginning. Perhaps in the same way that when one life ends, another begins. I say this a few times on the album, but I believe life does go in cycles. It will bring us around again.
Coming over this next month:
1. A huge announcement about something finally being on Spotify * very soon *
2. A new full “revisited deluxe” version of the album on Spotify and Apple with all of the songs that originally had samples remade as original beats, plus all of the bonus tracks that I always thought belonged on KYFC
3. Two more singles before the new version of the album
4. Movement merch that I’ve always wanted to print for Keep Your Friends Close (designed by me)
5. A collaborative digital art & memory magazine that I am making with all of you guys: please be a part of it by submitting at “keepyourfriendsclosethealbum.com"
6. Probably some more stuff I’ll come up with along the way
7. CDs, and you guessed it…. VINYL !
This project was made in various dorm rooms and hometown bedrooms. It was a product of heartbreak, camaraderie with those who believed in me, and most importantly — the power of you guys on the other side of my laptop spreading the word. What began as a mixtape to be distributed for free on music blogs kind of turned into an album. 25,000 people downloaded it when I dropped this thing on Hulkshare or Mediafire or whatever it was at the time. Is it a perfect album? Definitely not. But is it a time capsule for so many of our lives in the sense that it encompasses years of memories (good and bad, but always visceral) in its tracklist? Think we all know the answer.
My long long list of thank you’s will come when this commemorative month ends. But for now thank you to my friends. Thank you to naebird who made this new deluxe version possible in 1000s of ways. Thank you to skinny atlas & devin arne who I originally made this with. mike falb the goat. To wes henry. ryan falcoa who is designing everything. To nicole rich. lydia kaseta. ceschi. gabe valle. kinetics & one love. I could go on for days but I’ll hold off for now.
10 years of long drives home later… This is still not the scenic route.
Love & stay tuned,
-Dylan