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Los Angeles-based indie rock band Near Beer are back with a new single, their first new song in a year. Today, we are happy to premiere ‘Al Pacino,’ out now on Double Helix Records. The song which packs a solid flow and is jangly in all the right places, sprung into being after vocalist Joey Siara bingewatched all of Pacino’s movies over the course of three weeks. Say hello to the band’s little friend below.

“I had never fully appreciated how magnetic he is as a presence on the screen,” shares Siara. “Even in the bad movies -- Pacino brings this electricity that transcends. There's also something to watching an actor in their 20s and then watching them change over the course of a several decades long career -- but still feeling that general life-force throughout. The Pacino-binge dove-tailed into revisiting The Sopranos pilot and series finale.

Between it all, I felt like there were these patterns of troubled dudes wrestling with the futility of existence -- but still wanting so badly to connect to something bigger. And that seems relatable and kind of sad but also fundamentally human. So it all goes into the stream-of-conscious soup of the song's lyrics.

The music came quickly. I was house-sitting at our old guitarist's place in LA. And he kept a bunch of my guitar gear when I moved to a tiny NYC apartment, so I picked up a guitar I hadn't played in a couple of years and wrote the little 12 string line and then recorded it with the band the very next day.

Also, just to say it, my friend Evangeline Young is the one who insisted that I take the Pacino plunge, and I am so glad I did -- so it felt right to get her voice on the chorus of the song as well.”

Now split between Los Angeles, New York, and Austin -- which makes the practicalities of recording much more complicated, Near Beer now appreciates band hang time more than ever before. Recorded at Joel's studio, the whole process was pretty relaxed; fueled by lots of pizza, burritos, beer and impromptu Beatles jams.

“There is something about ‘bandness’ that I love,” continues Siara. “And the ‘bandness’ of NEAR BEER has grown. Two of my dearest friends from totally different eras of my life (Joel Wall and Stephen Kirkham) joined the band last year, which changed the entire dynamic and expanded the sound. They each bring their personalities. And their personalities are super fun. Despite the slackery aesthetic of the band, I am prone to nit-pick, but something about the new line-up and the looseness of the recording process made me a lot less nit-picky”