“Dear River” is the first single, and the title track, from Emily Barker & The Red Clay Halo‘s forthcoming new album. The album will be released on July 8th on Linn Records.

Having released three critically acclaimed albums, played a string of sold-out UK dates, performed with Frank Turner at the London 2012 Olympics Opening Ceremony and written the Bafta and Ivor Novello award-winning themes to hit BBC dramas Wallander and The Shadow Line, Emily Barker & The Red Clay Halo will release the album Dear River this July via Linn Records.

Full of contrasting dynamics and a broad cavalcade of emotions, the exuberant track – a letter to the Blackwood River in Western Australia on the eve of her departure into the big, wide unknown – is the launch pad for the album’s fascinating exploration of self, place and people. “Dear River is a song about journey,” says Emily, “it is a longing for the unfamiliar, where the journey itself becomes a home. However, the more I travel and experience, the more the river calls me back and I start longing for what I knew: those first landscapes, those first loves’’

“Dear River” is available to download from iTunes.