Songwriter Sam Cohen spent long stints as a bandleader, working as the core of the ecstatic Apollo Sunshine for the entirety of the aughts and then with Yellowbirds for the first part of the 2010's. After Yellowbirds called it a day in 2014, Cohen spent some time working on other people's projects but still managed to write a new set of sun-dazzled synth-rock tunes for his first album under his own name, 2015's Cool It. He followed it with The Future's Still Ringing in My Ears in 2019. Multi-instrumentalist singer/songwriter Sam Cohen was born in Houston, Texas, and started his first widely recognized band, Apollo Sunshine, shortly after attending a Berklee College of Music summer performance program and meeting his future bandmates there. Apollo Sunshine were active from 2001 until 2009, creating a psychedelic indie pop sound informed by both classic '60s artists and contemporary pop experimentalists like the Elephant 6 collective. Residing in Brooklyn when the band broke up, Cohen began recording by himself under the moniker Yellowbirds, a project that quickly expanded from solo bedroom productions into a full-fledged band. Yellowbirds released several singles and two full-length albums before disbanding in 2014. During that time, Cohen was very busy with other musical pursuits, working as a session player for artists ranging from Norah Jones to CeeLo Green. Between 2012 and 2014, he also served as a player, vocalist, and musical director for the touring production of The Complete Last Waltz, a live show that had Cohen conducting contemporary musicians through readings of all 41 songs from the Band's 1976 concert film The Last Waltz, including tunes that were cut from the film. With his busy schedule, Cohen still found time to write and record new material, and in 2015, his first non-band solo effort arrived with the roots indie psych of Cool It. He continued to stay active as a session player, and returned four years later with his second solo album, The Future's Still Ringing in My Ears. The record was inspired by an impromptu studio session between Cohen and producer Danger Mouse. Though Cohen didn't have any songs written for the project when studio time unexpectedly became available, Danger Mouse encouraged him to work on new material, which ultimately became the album. Around the time of the LP's May 2019 release, he went on tour with Kevin Morby, whose 2019 album Oh My God he produced. ~ Fred Thomas