The California Honeydrops Confirm New Album ‘Soft Spot’ & Share Single

The California Honeydrops announced a new album, Soft Spot, due out on October 7 via their Tubtone Records. The Bay Area band also shared the single, “Takin’ My Time.”

Soft Spot follows The California Honeydrops’ — vocalist/guitarist/trumpeter Lech Wierzynkski, drummer Ben Malament, bassist Beau Bradbury, keyboardist Lorenzo Loera and clarinet/saxophonist Johnny Bones — 2022 covers album, Covers From The Cave, a pair of live records and an original EP, Just One More, And Then Some, which arrived in 2020. In 2018, The California Honeydrops released a 16 track, two-volume effort, Call It Home.

Soft Spot is the band’s first original full length studio album since Call It Home. Honeydrops drummer and co-founder Ben Malament detailed the jubilant sessions for the new record:

“The first thing many people say to us after watching the band perform on stage is ‘Man, you all LOVE to play together!’ That’s why Soft Spot is such an important album, because we didn’t get to play and hunker down as a full band like this for almost two years! After a few of us recorded the Covers from the Cave album, strictly from home for our quarantined fans, it was a pleasure and privilege to let loose all together in the beautiful Oakland studio, bouncing off each other with creativity, jokes, and sweat, with Thai food and donuts, day after day, night after night. The music on Soft Spot speaks that joy and diligence. Sometimes we recorded when we were hella sick or had pulled back muscles—getting older is tough! Sometimes we recorded on our birthdays and had cake next to the mics. When you get good sounds, you can’t stop! And all the sounds we were getting were good. Really good. And that’s when the recording is easy.

We continued the Honeydrops album tradition of bringing many special musical guests to bless the studio with their magic. Sousaphones, strings, space echoes, it’s all here. Our engineer, Jacob LaCally’s, aka ‘Cubby’s,’ fine ears and maybe finer patience kept the session rolling through the hours. Leon Cotter and Scott Messersmith have become staples of the Honeydrop sound, filling the room with the full band sensation we could lean back on.

We enlisted the Kid Wonder and Oakland native, Oliver Tuttle, with his beautiful energy and ideas and the ‘Ponchatoula Powerhouse,’ Miles Lyons, dropped in from Louisiana to add a whole new low end to our music!

This album has our unique Honeydrop take on many styles of music, all under a cohesive production style so there’s no confusion. There’s no provin’. Only groovin’. Soft Spot is a special one. We can’t tell you how happy we are to have made it and to give you these new songs.”

One of those new songs is lead single, “Takin’ My Time.” Frontman Lech Wierzynkski described the song’s subject matter: “Slow down, erase your social media, smoke some weed, watch the sunset, get out of the rat race.”

Listen to “Takin’ My Time” below:

Soft Spot Tracklist:

1. Honey and Butter
2. Gonna Be Alright
3. Nothing at All
4. I Miss You Baby, Pt. 1
5. Tumblin’
6. Takin’ My Time
7. The Unicorn
8. Soft Spot
9. In Your Arms
10. Lil Bit of Love
11. Sneakin’ into Heaven
12. I Miss You Baby, Pt. 2