For Canadian singer-songwriter Liam Duncan, who performs as Boy Golden, enlightenment comes when one puts others ahead of themselves. Different cultures have come up with different words, including Buddhists, who use “Bodhisattva”.
“I chase – and often find – a sense of no-self (or a flow state),” Duncan says via press release. “In this state, I cease to identify with my body, my thoughts, my problems…Each new body of work I have finished has pushed me personally towards greater acceptance of myself as a whole person.”
“I think there isn’t really a difference between your spiritual life and your day-to-day,” he tells SWT. “If you are divorcing those two things, you’re probably not really living that well.”
Those lyrical themes are at the center of his latest album, Best of Our Possible Lives, which is out Friday, February 13, via Six Shooter Records.
While there are parts of the day that seem difficult and don’t feel like they have much meaning, Duncan feels that “there’s really no material difference between sitting in traffic and sitting at home.” One is just something that feels more frustrating.
“I think those themes come up in my music because they come up in my life,” he says. “I don’t always write autobiographically, but all of my writing is informed by my experience. And that’s my personal take on spiritual matters is that it’s your day-to-day.”
As Boy Golden, Duncan has pushed himself to write songs that venture beyond personal life events (as he called creating a “quotidian everyday journal”) and capture things that are bigger, universal, and philosophical in nature.
“I think there was a trend towards really autobiographical, very raw, tell-all songwriting over the last little while in pop music. And I guess I just didn’t really want to do that,” he says. “I was like, ‘I love songwriting that can tell a story and make maybe a larger point.’”
“And obviously you can make a larger point with your autobiographical songs as well, but I think I did always want to push myself to just try and write about bigger themes and still make it a fun listen, not pretentious.”
To achieve this, he started asking himself a series of big-picture questions: Why are people good to each other? Why are they so horrible to each other? Who put me here, in this body? What does love mean to me? What does friendship mean to me? What does it mean to lose something important and go on living? Why do we suffer?
According to the press release, the album draws “inspiration from Buddhist philosophy and his own personal journey with sexuality and loss…Boy Golden crafts songs of self-discovery with an anthemic blend of timeless folk-pop, neo-traditionalist country and swaggering indie rock that will captivate you from the very first note.”
For example, on “Suffer,” he draws on his interest and practice in meditation, Buddhism, Taoism, and art-making, and concludes that suffering is what pulls everyone together and not apart. Finding commonality in suffering, he feels it helps lead to self-acceptance.
While his past work as Boy Golden had more of a DIY lo-fi sound, Best of Our Possible Lives captures a bigger, fuller, and more ambitious sound that’s aided by talented collaborators. Bringing on producer Robbie Lackritz, best known for his work with artists such as Feist, Bahamas, and The Weather Station, was key to achieving that goal.
Recording at Lucy’s Meat Market in Los Angeles, Lackritz assembled a talented backing group featuring Pino Palladino (D’Angelo), Abe Rounds (Meshell Ndegeocello), Gabe Noel (Father John Misty), and Joseph Shabason (Destroyer) alongside Church of Better Daze founding members FONTINE and Austin Parachoniak.
The album follows studio albums If I Don’t Feel Better (2019; as Liam Duncan), Church of Better Daze (2021), and For Eden (2024), as well as EPs For Jimmy (2023) and Finding Eden (2025).
It continues Duncan’s remarkable journey. According to a press release, his journey has taken him from a “rural upbringing in Canada where he and his friends would ice fish on frozen lakes” to finding adventure in “big city” Toronto and success and community in Winnipeg. Here in the frozen Midwest, we can definitely relate to that. If we haven’t done it ourselves, our friends and relatives definitely have many, many winters.
Thanks to his chameleon-like sound and thoughtful lyrics, his first headline tours were wildly successful, with many shows selling out. Festival appearances at Bonnaroo, Jackalope Jamboree, Osheaga, and the Winnipeg Folk Festival have helped him gain more fans. As has opening for acts such as Joshua Ray Walker, The Paper Kites, Birdtalker, The Sheepdogs, and Lucero.
SWT caught up with Duncan to discuss his new music, growth as a songwriter, and his touring plans for this year. If you’d like to watch my full interview with Liam Duncan of Boy Golden on video, including a bonus tutorial, check it out here. You can read Alex’s review here.
What are some songs and artists that you’ve been digging of late?
Good question. Let me quickly open my music. Oh, you know what I’ve been listening to so much, and maybe this is boring, but I’ve been listening to Lateral. It’s the new album from Brian Eno and Beatie Wolfe. It’s an hour-long ambient record. I pretty much listen to it every morning. I’ve been listening to I Keep My Feet on the Fragile Plane by Allegra Krieger a lot. I’ve been listening to all of Angela Autumn’s discography a lot. I listen to Paul Simon a lot in general. And yesterday I was listening to Mudslide Jim and The Blue Horizon, the James Taylor record, which is a classic. So that’s kind of what I’ve been spinning.
Nice, diverse selections.
Yeah, totally.
You’ve gone on quite the journey from small-town Canada to a couple of bigger cities. How do you think that path has aided you as an artist to where you are now?
When I started playing music, I started playing with a couple of my friends from high school. It’s a pretty classic story, but well maybe slightly not classic. We toured a lot. We played like 600 shows together between the ages of like 17 and 21, all over Canada and America. And we even toured in Japan a little bit, which was pretty cool. And I think that was a great education in parts of how the business works, but also just playing every night. We would record our shows and listen back to our shows and just try and get better all the time. And I think that instilled a real respect for musicianship in all of us, which I still have.
Sounds like it was a very DIY kind of [mindset].
It was. Yeah, it was very DIY. We did all the work ourselves. Eventually, we did have an agent, and eventually, we did have a manager, which was awesome, except that we broke up not that long after we got both of those things. So, we never really got the opportunity to see what that felt like. Of course, now I also started this project very DIY and it has since kind of grown to … I have people around me who take good care of the business and myself.
What’s the story behind the band’s name, Boy Golden?
My mom’s last name is Golden, and I am her boy, and thus Boy Golden was born. A lot of people think it is to do with my home … Well, not my hometown, but the place that I live now, which is called Winnipeg. And on our legislative building, there is a gigantic Golden Boy statue. It’s like 28 feet tall or something that was given to Winnipeg by, I believe, France back in the 1800s. And it is actually a very impressive statue. Golden Boy is ripped, is looking good, it’s naked, holding a shaft of wheat. And a lot of people think that that’s what Boy Golden was from, but that’s not it. But I mean, hey, whatever. As long as you remember the name, it’s all good.
I think the press materials mention the songs pulling from Buddhist philosophy. Can you talk a little bit about how those two work so well together?
Yeah. I have spent a lot of time reading Buddhist philosophy, reading Eastern philosophy. I’ve also spent a lot of time reading Western people interpreting Eastern philosophy, which is like kind of its own genre, I think. And I’ve spent time sitting a lot of meditation over the years. I still do and I just find those philosophies fit my life really well. So that’s kind of how I see the world, so that’s why it comes out in my writing, I think.
What’s the story behind the album’s title, and how is it reflected in the themes?
So, the album’s title came from two things. It came from a Kris Kristofferson tune called “Best of All Possible Worlds”. It’s a really great song that I learned a few years ago and that always kind of stuck with me. And I always thought that turn of phrase was really interesting. And then when I started looking into that turn of phrase, “Best of All Possible Worlds”, it actually is from an old philosopher, [Gottfried Wilhelm] Leibniz. German guy who argued that if God is benevolent and omniscient and omnipotent, then the world that we’re living in must be the best possible world. And then a bunch of people like Voltaire thought that was really silly and how could this possibly be the best of all possible worlds? There’s so much suffering, which I kind of tend to agree with. But then, I don’t know where it came from when I was actually writing that song, but I just sort of kind of tried to come full circle with it and go like, “Well, you know what? This is the life I have. This is the best possible life that I have created for myself so far.” So that’s where the song came from.
Your music draws on a variety of styles and influences. Why do you feel that approach is appealing? And how do you think this album compares to your past work?
I think this is my best album, for sure. It’s the best-sounding album. I think it’s the most ambitious album in a lot of ways, but as far as the wide-ranging influences go…I don’t know how to make anything other than what I make. So, it’s not really intentional. I just like a lot of different kinds of music, so I think a lot of different kinds of music makes its way into what I’m trying to do.
Do you have any specific sonic goals with this album?
Yeah, I did have some sonic goals. I wanted to make this the best-sounding album. On all my other records, I’ve engineered, produced, and sometimes mixed them myself, which was a good process. I learned a lot by doing that. I’ve also produced and mixed for a lot of other artists so far in my life, and I’ll probably continue to do that. So doing it for myself was really what made me feel quite confident doing it. That said, after I finished making my last two records and mixing them myself and recording them myself and everything, I was like, “I can’t do this again. This is too much work.” I also feel like you make some compromises if you’re doing everything and I didn’t want to compromise. I was like, “I want to take a big swing here and also just perform as best I can. ” So yeah, with this record, I hired a producer who also engineered and mixed, and I also went down to L.A. and recorded it in a real studio.
All my other records have been home recordings and I think it shows. I think it sounds great. It sounds huge. And I’m curious to hear what people think of it because the fans that I do have probably gotten used to a bit more of a lo-fi sound and this one is not that, it’s hi-fi, but that’s what I wanted. I wanted it to be hi-fi. I wanted it to just sound great.
That actually leads into my next question. You’ve got to work with a pretty talented producer and some backing musicians. How did those come about, and how did they help you more fully realize the songs?
So, the producer was the first piece of the puzzle. His name is Robbie Lackritz. He’s done a lot of amazing work for Feist, Bahamas, Alvvays, Jack Johnson, lots more, but those are the big ones. And I’ve always liked his work a lot. Big fan of Feist. I just think she’s an incredible artist. And I met him one time, and then I think my management sent him music, and then he ended up actually working with my management team on his producer stuff. And then he liked the songs a lot, and we started chatting, and we were getting along really well. And so, then we decided we would make the record together, which was great. It came together pretty quick. And he already knew these other musicians that he wanted to hire. He had worked with Pino Palladino on a Bahamas album and sent the demos to him and he liked the songs and he had worked with Abe Rounds on, I think a Madison Cunningham record, I think.
And I loved Abe. I was just checking out a bunch of music that he’d played on, and I just thought he was such a phenomenal drummer. So, I was very excited about both of those options. I thought they were just incredible, incredible musicians. And then he also brought in this other musician named Gabe Noel, who’s played on an absurd amount of records and he was fascinating to work with. And I actually, I love everything that he added to the songs. And then finally, my friend, Austin Parachoniak, who works with me on almost everything I do, was on the whole record as well. And in my opinion, Austin is just as good as any of those other famous side musicians.
What song or songs most shaped the direction of the album? I think
The first single, “Suffer,” shaped the direction of the album. I think Like a Child…which is the third single, shaped the direction of the album a lot. And then maybe the other, the song that I threw at the studio musicians first was called “New Orleans”. It’s not out yet. It’ll be out when the album comes out, but that was the first song I threw at them because it was hard. The form is weird. It’s got a bunch of bars of five here and there. It also goes to six at one point. It’s just a tricky and strange song, but to me, always felt like one of my best. And kind of a really good example of the style of writing I’ve been working on. So, I think that one set the tone for the whole recording process, just throwing the hardest song at them first and being like, “All right, what are you going to do with this?” And yeah, it turned out perfectly. It was wonderful.
What’s one of your favorite live experiences of performing from the past year?
I think we played just like our best show at this festival in Edmonton, Alberta in Canada in September. I don’t know what it was. I feel like our band has always been quite good, but we’ve just been getting kind of better, and for some reason, that show I think we all just felt was kind of one of our best performances ever. So that was probably my favorite live experience of the past year, I think. Other than that, we cut the record … A lot of the record is cut live, so I don’t know. That doesn’t really count as a live experience, but it was some of my favorite musical playing I’ve ever done, just making this album.
Is that the first time that you played live on this recording?
No. My second album was all live, and then the other two have been multi-tracked, kind of one piece at a time. But even when I do it one piece at a time, I’m kind of doing it somewhat live. I often just try and … If I have two people in a room, I’m just going to try and get them to play together. Even if we’re not recording the entire production live, we’re recording pieces of it in a live kind of way. So, I always like to capture as much of it as I can, but this album was … There’s like lots of it is very, very live, and we would just overdub little things, harmonies, percussion, and stuff that you’d normally overdub.
What are you most looking forward to this year? Do you have any tour plans?
Yeah, we’ve got lots of tour plans. I’m really looking forward to obviously putting out this album, something we’ve been working towards for quite a while now. I’m really looking forward to … I’ve got this cross-Canada tour opening up for an artist, William Prince, who I really love. I love his music. I actually produced his last album as well, so it feels really special to be on tour with him. And then I’m doing another tour opening for my friend, Kat Clyde, who is a featured artist on several of the songs on the new album. And then we’ve got a busy festival season. So, I’m really, really happy and grateful for all the work.
Well, good luck with everything.
Thank you. Thanks, Josh.
My final two questions are SWT related. Do you have a favorite Replacement song or memory related to the band?
No, I’m afraid not. I did look into your publication before, and I was like, “Oh, he’s a big Replacements fan.” I don’t really know their music, so that’s just a big gap in my memory hole. Just didn’t grow up with it, so yeah.
Do you have any stories or memories related to water towers?
Yes, actually. On my first album, there’s a song called “A Little Space”, and there’s a lyric that goes “under the water tower / the first place we got high / smoking out of a tin can / coughing, laughing, smoke in our eyes.” So, there you go. I don’t think that was actually the first place I ever got high, but there was a water tower nearby my house and I don’t know. I guess I was just thinking about that, and so wrote it into the song.
Was that a place where you got together with people?
I don’t even really know if it was. I think I was just sort of fictionalizing my life.
Any final thoughts on the album?
Oh man. Yeah. Just really proud of it. Really hope people get to hear it, and I hope they like it. I hope it brings something into their life that they didn’t have before. So, thanks for showcasing it, Josh. Appreciate it.
You can follow and listen to Boy Golden at the following links:
His website: Boygolden.ca
Instagram: Instagram.com/boygolden
TikTok: Tiktok.com/@ya.boy.golden
Facebook: Facebook.com/boygolden
Spotify: Boy Golden on Spotify
Bandcamp: Yaboygolden.bandcamp.com
Joshua is co-founder of Scummy Water Tower. He’s freelanced for a variety of newspapers, magazines, and websites, including: Rolling Stone, The Boston Globe, Chicago Sun-Times, Guitar World, MTV News, Grammy.com, Chicago Magazine, Milwaukee Magazine, MKE Lifestyle, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, A.V. Club, SPIN, Alternative Press, Under the Radar, Paste, PopMatters, American Songwriter, and Relix. You can email him at josh@scummywatertower.com.
