Vertigo is the debut studio album by Irish musician Eden, released on 19 January 2018 through his own label MCMXCV and distributed by Astralwerks. It was produced, mixed and recorded in New York, Los Angeles and Dublin. The album was supported by a world tour.
Background and recording
The entirety of vertigo was written, recorded, produced, mixed and mastered by EDEN, with very little outside help. In the third edition of his yearly video series, 365x, EDEN said, "This album has been for me since I first started thinking about working on it, years ago. It has been a catalyst of change in so many ways for me, and it's taught me so much more about myself than I ever thought it would. I made vertigo by myself, for myself, but it's finished now. So maybe it could be for you." About his thought process when choosing the title, he said, "That’s a really weird one because when I first started thinking about the album it was always called vertigo. It just felt right at the time. I didn’t really sit down and brainstorm it. I guess the album has a lot of disorientation in it, not sonically but as in the lyric content and personally. As I said before, it just felt right and that’s what I wanted the album to be… something that just felt right." About releasing the album, EDEN said, "It's more like I'm uncovering something that's already there. Like how an archaeologist doesn't create a fossil–they're just finding it and uncovering it, and maybe rearranging it if it's broken. Releasing this body of work is terrifying and exciting and overwhelming for me. A lot of it is so personal. This album is not a coming of age story, but it caused one."
Promotion
A scavenger hunt took place on 7 and 8 November 2017 in 13 cities across the world. At each location, posters contained a secret Spotify link to the single "gold" two days prior to its release. A track titled "vertigo_crowd_22.10.16" was also released on the ghost Spotify account. The track largely consists of a soundbite from the final show of EDEN's 2016 Futurebound Tour, in which he instructs the audience to call out certain words. EDEN held four pre-album screenings the week of the album's release: one in Dublin, London, New York City, and Los Angeles. Free tickets were provided by email to fans who pre-ordered the digital album through his online store.
Videos
The album's first single, "start//end," was released 28 September 2017, accompanied by a music video containing shots from various cities such as Dublin, London, Paris, Hong Kong, Seoul, Los Angeles, New York City and Tokyo. The second single, "gold", was released on 10 November 2017. Its music video contains shots of a family living in the countryside. The video for "crash," released 8 December 2017, depicts the former husband of that family reminiscing about his past. On the album's release day, the tenth track on the album, "float," received a music video. In the video, "otherworldly happenings" illustrate the way that seemingly small moments in relationships often have massive impacts.
Tour
EDEN announced the Vertigo World Tour on 10 November 2017. The tour visited cities across North America and Europe, March through May 2018. It was later extended to include a third, fourth and fifth leg.
