For Toronto-based singer-songwriter Kirty, making records is the art of making time capsules of your own life. She’s been at it since she was a kid, growing up on a hobby farm outside of Orillia, Ontario. A middle child in a large musical family, from a young age she was taught the country, folk, and rock n‘ roll standards, sparking in her those natural, timeless kind of songwriting instincts that can only be cultivated from the pop songsmiths of the 20th century.

After making several homemade “time capsule” albums on her own, Kirty signed with Postwar Records in 2016 and released her first official album, a self-titled effort that found success on the CBC radio top 20 chart and several international placements in commercials and TV.

Around the same time, Kirty joined acclaimed indie-rock band Fast Romantics as a singer and multi-instrumentalist, and quickly became a core member, co-writing several songs for the group and touring internationally and relentlessly in the years that followed.

All of these experiences brought her to 2019, and after a whirlwind of new musical influences reached a climax, she began working on a new record of her own. Songs came fast and furious, marking in time her experiences on the road, the passing of close family members, and a growing relationship — both musical and romantic — with her Fast Romantics bandmate and songwriting partner Matthew Angus.

The pair teamed up with longtime Kirty collaborator Josh Van Tassel to round out a production team, and began work on recording the new songs, mixing her newfound affection for the sounds of 90s garage and synth-rock with more modern dream-pop influences.

As 2020 comes to a close, Kirty has teased a first taste of the now-finished album, the appropriately titled This Year’s Been Hell. A sparkling, melancholy song written about pausing her own life to work through the struggle of a close relative in their final chapter of life. As Kirty said, the title is a “wild, wild coincidence.” But while she couldn’t have anticipated releasing it in the midst of a pandemic, civil unrest, environmental crisis, and a political circus… it still somehow feels timely and more meaningful than ever.

Album details and further singles will be released in the first months of 2021.