Clare and the Reasons call Brooklyn home, but after touring around the world extensively for their first 2 albums, they needed a new setting, one that would make them see and hear differently. In 2011, for 8 months, they lived in an apartment on Berlin's Bergstrasse, on the western edges of what used to be the East. They bought a Schwalbe moped--model KR-51, and sped around the city at a velocity the congested New York streets would have prohibited. While riding under the vast skies of Berlin, the city, a blurred filmstrip of cobblestones, trees, and graffiti, they dreamed up the sounds of the new record. After months of writing under the influence of Berlin they packed up a van and drove to a town near the Dutch border called Rees-Haldern to record the album, Oct-Nov of 2011. They recorded for long hours, in between bicycling in and around cow fields under an unimaginable number of stars.

The band sunk themselves into a city of many histories, a city of concrete boxes and fluted columns, and those contrasts--at times stark and streamlined, at times grandly lush--show up in the 12 songs on KR-51. They carry the meticulous orchestration Clare and the Reasons are known for--while also carrying a little more sorrow, a little more guitar shredding, and a little more darkness of heart. Clare's father sings on ""Get Down On Your knees" and an and orchestra made up of members of the Orchestre de Paris materialized, which they recorded in Paris. This album is their Berlin.

Clare and the gang have spent the past four years touring around the world in support of their past two records Arrow and The Movie. Live, they have a steady list of contributors, with a lot of instruments– cellos, violas, things to hit, kazoos, baby kotos, saws, recorders, and a bass drum that says “Kaboom” on it. It took a bit of wood, nails and many blankets to make their sophmore record, Arrow, in a recording tent built in the Ditmas Park apartment of Clare and the Reasons’ neighbor, friend and engineer, Alex Venguer. Clare and the Reasons deliver an assortment of meticulously constructed and arranged songs, most written by Clare in her very own kitchen, arranged by Olivier in the living room with two cats by his side, and recorded with surgical precision with the help of “Reason” Bob Hart. Walking the line between musical maturity and sophistication and primal, childlike musical instincts, Arrow floats in both worlds, comfortably.

In the midst of nothing but glowing reviews of both “Arrow” and live shows Clare and the Reasons toured US/Canada 3 times for “Arrow” thus far with Van Dyke Parks, Vic Chesnutt and Nouvelle Vague. They did an extensive euro tour in March 2010. The Reasons have euro festivals this summer (including Primavera Sound and Meltdown Festival in London) and another USA tour with Van Dyke Parks in fall 2010. You can hear Clare’s voice throughout the first season singing on the beloved show ”Arrested Development”. Clare has 2 songs in new French films, “Jusqua Toi”, and “Les Nuits de Sister Welsh”. Van Dyke Parks says, “Clare is the Reasons’ raison d’être. Melodious et mysterieux–(the group) defines esprit de corps. (wrapped in) elegant arrangements for your dream escape— Chamber music with edge. Get this Visa to real musical adventure. Totally transportive!”