Silver Torches

Silver Torches crafts emotionally charged pop songs that shift between languid and urgent textures, fronted by Seattle, Washington native Erik Walters as the band’s vocalist and primary songwriter. Walters first gained hands-on experience with music during junior high by participating in his school’s jazz ensemble, then carried that involvement forward through his high school music program. In 2010 he joined three jazz-band peers—Sean McCotter, Kyle Musselwhite, and Marcus Ourada—to launch an indie-rock outfit called the Globes, which built a regional audience and secured a contract with Barsuk Records for the 2011 release Future Self. The Globes disbanded the following year, leaving Walters to consider an accumulated catalog of his own material; he chose to record a solo project and issued The Living Fact himself in 2014 under the Silver Torches moniker. The understated launch drew little attention, prompting Walters to accept road work with Telekinesis! and Perfume Genius while preparing a follow-up. He unveiled Heatherfield, the second Silver Torches album, in January 2016; Walters again handled most instrumentation, though Sean Lane, Ed Brooks, Henri Bardot, Emily Westman, and producer Steven Aguilar contributed guest spots. Critics responded favorably, and Silver Torches delivered its third long-player, Let It Be a Dream, in October 2017. By then Walters had stabilized a touring unit that included Andy Park on keyboards, Jonathan Warman on bass and guitar, and Sean Lane on drums and percussion.