Chicago songwriter and guitarist Walker Landgraf shares his music under the name Walker, and he released the first single off of his upcoming second album Good Man shortly after he released his debut album, Phew.
He recorded nearly every instrument heard on his new album. Outside of a few appearances by friends, like Noé Mina of Soul Food Horns on trumpet over the track “Without You,” he wrote, recorded, and produced everything in his apartment.
At the center of Walker’s music is a relationship between his affinity for Pop and his musical background. He grew up in LA where he played Jazz guitar and before studying music production in NYC, and he bridges his two interests to create his music.
Walker is open about the fact that he passed on being cast in The Voice this year to focus on recording music at home.
Landgraf says of the new album:
Good Man was not a record I intended to make. I just released my first record Phew last winter, then I got cast in The Voice. It felt like it was time to take a little break and recalibrate. Then, a couple of things happened. First, I received an artist grant from the City of Chicago and was able to buy recording equipment that I had been dreaming about for some years. I plugged in, started testing it all out, and realized it granted me access to a whole new world.
He continues:
Secondly, even though I was proud of Phew, I felt it didn’t fully communicate who I was as an artist or a person. As I continued to test the new equipment and write songs from this new perspective it dawned on me that I had reached the next creative level. I made another record and I called it Good Man as a declaration of the new confidence that I could feel inside.
