MAISIE PETERS

For a year Maisie Peters has tinkered and tinkered, she has painstakingly put together many a thing, only to smash it to bits again a little later. And now she is ready to share the result of her work with the world: "The Good Witch" is the title of her new album, which will be released on June 23 via Gingerbread Man Records/Asylum and can be pre-ordered now (track listing below). A first glimpse of the upcoming work had recently been offered by the lead single "Body Better," a vulnerable song in which Maisie grapples with the agonizing question after a breakup: "What does she have that I don't?" "The Good Witch" is the second studio album from the West Sussex, UK-based singer-songwriter, whose debut, "You Signed Up For This" (2021), immediately reached No. 2 on the UK charts and was ennobled with a "BRIT Breakthrough" certification. "The Good Witch" is in many ways the older, wiser and yes, also: cheated out of some hopes counterpart to the debut - "witching season is approaching and some unnamed individuals should be very afraid <3", Maisie posted tellingly on TikTok earlier this week. The songs on "The Good Witch" were written practically in real time amid a crazy year of touring and shows around the world, including supporting Ed Sheeran's world tour. The album is a time capsule for Maisie, documenting a period of her life marked by career highs, personal lows and trying to bring all of that into a healthy balance. Whereas "You Signed Up For This" had been an observational coming-of-age album, on "The Good Witch" we encounter a Maisie looking deep inside herself and reflecting on herself, inspired by the works of Joan Didion and J. M. Barrie, Greek mythology and Western films. The album explores the complexities of breakups, the preciousness of friendship and the importance of one's self-worth. Overall, "The Good Witch" steps it up a notch in every way: the storytelling is even more perceptive, the artistic ambition even greater, and Maisie brings a newfound confidence to the songs she wrote in London, Suffolk, Stockholm, Bergen and L.A. along with Oscar Görres (Taylor Swift, Troye Sivan), Two Inch Punch (Sam Smith, Jessie Ware), Matias Tellez (Girl in Red), Brad Ellis (Jorja Smith, Little Mix), Joe Rubel (Ed Sheeran, Tom Grennan) and Elvira Anderfjärd (Tove Lo, Katy Perry). Maisie says, "I wrote each page with my heart, soul and blood. They are stories I've collected over the past year, simply by living them. It's a true chronicle of my life over the past few months, my own twisted version of a breakup album. The lines between the real and the surreal sometimes blur a bit, but the focus is razor sharp: it's about my own world, to which, of course, only I hold the keys and maps. I am the good witch, 'The Good Witch', if you will. The atmosphere changes sometimes so abruptly, as if a switch were flipped. I hope after listening to the album, you feel like you've gone on a journey and gotten lost on someone else's planet for a little while." This spring, Maisie Peters embarks on a headlining tour of the UK and several European cities on our planet. These will be the biggest concerts yet for the musician, who sold more than 20,000 tickets for the shows, with quite a few - such as at London's Eventim Apollo on April 27 - selling out within minutes. The German dates (May 6 - Berlin, Heimathafen Neukölln; May 7 - Cologne, Carlswerk Victoria) have also been sold out for weeks. Other live highlights for Maisie in the coming months include a headline slot at Sound City in Liverpool on April 30 and a sold-out show at the Brighton Dome as part of the Great Escape Festival on May 12, where she has been confirmed alongside Arlo Parks as one of the two 2023 Spotlight Shows. More support shows for Ed Sheeran in the U.S. will follow starting in late August. - The Good Witch comes to Europe