Nellie McKay - Hey Guys, Watch Thi (2025)

Under the lonesome cry of the midnight train, stars twinkling over hillbilly lights in the mountain fog, Nellie McKay returns with her new album, Hey Guys, Watch This.

Recorded in Charleston, West Virginia with The Carpenter Ants—Michael Lipton, Ted Harrison, Jupie Little, and Mark Bates—and a roving retinue of musical compadres, Hey Guys, Watch This traces the haunted sounds of Appalachia through lush sonic textures. So unpack your washtub bass, fill up your red cup, and pull on your shitkickers—’cos the night is young and the moon is bright, even if we’re not.

Hey Guys, Watch This will be available on CD and for the first time as an LP, with updated artwork and remastering by multiple Grammy winner Michael Graves.

ABOUT NELLIE McKAY
Nellie has produced an array of wildly varying albums, including her groundbreaking 2004 debut Get Away From Me and Normal As Blueberry Pie: A Tribute To Doris Day (“among the killer overhauls of American standards”—The New York Times). On Obligatory Villagers (2007), local Poconos hometown jazz greats Bob Dorough, Phil Woods, and David Liebman contribute their exceptional talents, and McKay’s album of saloon songs, Sister Orchid, speaks of the night, the outsider, the plaintive wail of those lost at sea. (The Star-Tribune calls Sister Orchid the most lonely, romantic album imaginable.”)

Her TV appearances include David Letterman, Conan O’Brien, Craig Ferguson and The View, and her music has been heard on Mad Men, Weeds, Boardwalk Empire, Grey’s Anatomy, NCIS, and Nurse Jackie.

Nellie has earned an Ovation nomination for her work as composer/performer in Ethan Coen’s A Play Is A Poem and won a Theatre World Award for her portrayal of Polly Peachum on Broadway in The Threepenny Opera. McKay co-created and starred in the award-winning off-Broadway hit Old Hats and has written and produced three acclaimed musical biographies—I Want to Live!, the story of Barbara Graham, third woman executed in the gas chamber at San Quentin, Silent Spring: It’s Not Nice To Fool Mother Nature, an exploration of environmental pioneer Rachel Carson, and A Girl Named Bill—The Life and Times Of Billy Tipton, named one of the year’s Best Concerts by The New York Times.

A recipient of PETA’s Humanitarian Award and the Humane Society’s Doris Day Music Award in recognition of her dedication to animal rights, Nellie is an annoyingly vocal critic of capitalism, endless wars, and the two-party system that sustains them, and, oh who gives a shit.

TRACKLIST

1. Nellie McKay - The Drinking Song
2. Nellie McKay - Luckiest Mood
3. Nellie McKay - Ba Dum Bump
4. Nellie McKay - Forever Home
5. Nellie McKay - Driftin
6. Nellie McKay - The Party Song
7. Nellie McKay - Queen Mary
8. Nellie McKay - Initiation
9. Nellie McKay - Did I Catch You Dreaming
10. Nellie McKay - Lali
11. Nellie McKay - Dreamliner
12. Nellie McKay - Make A Wish