[Cover photo credit to Janell Shirtcliff]

Orchestral Pop singer-songwriter L.C. Franke has revealed his debut single, “You and Me and Us Against the World,” via Side Hustle Records. The track heralds Franke’s upcoming debut album, Still In Bloom, arriving on July 19, 2024.

A lyric video for “You and Me and Us Against the World,” as well as a live performance clip filmed in Austin, TX are both out now.

L.C. Franke shares:

I was ready to give up on everything. So I wrote a song to give myself hope – to remind myself and my friends that, no matter how much they get you down, you can still rise above it.

In a previous music life, L.C. Franke was known as Jeff Klein, an Austin-by-way-of-New York Indie Rocker who worked as a solo artist, as a collaborator with countless other songwriters, and as frontman of the Southern gothic Soul outfit My Jerusalem.

The opportunity for reinvention presented itself when his friend, the Bessie Award-winning dancer Melissa Toogood, asked him to compose the score for her performance with the Boston Ballet. Franke bought a Mellotron and got to work.

As he explored, Franke sat down at the piano and wrote “You and Me and Us Against the World,” the song that shaped his new musical approach. Borrowing inspiration from his grandmother’s records, and paying homage to her with his name, L.C. Franke was born.

Still In Bloom is “the sound of midlife crisis turned spiritual rebirth.”

L.C. Franke will perform with a small string section at this year’s SXSW, including appearances on March 14 at St. David’s Bethel Hall at 11pm, as well as performances during the Austin City Limits Radio (March 14) and KUTX (March 15) morning shows.