Nashville singer-songwriter-producer, Mokita (aka John-Luke Carter) has announced his new EP, Color Me In out October 28th via Nettwerk. The announcement arrives with the title track single and a visualizer shot and edited by Zach Pigg. Watch the video now below.
Of Color Me In, Mokita said, “Jon Foreman, one of my favorite songwriters, has a line from a song called ‘Thrive’ that says: ‘I want to thrive, not just survive’. That line envelops the general sentiment of this song. One of my greatest fears has always been normalcy. I’ve always felt that in order to be worth something, that I needed to stand out; that I needed to exceed people’s expectations. The last line of the chorus says ‘tell me I’m a shade that’s never been found’. We all want to feel like we matter, like we are unique, that we have something to offer. We also want to know that we are not alone in feeling ‘messed up’ or lost. Everyone’s greatest search in life is finding the thing that fills them to the utmost. Everyone wants to be fully colored in.”
When asked about the meaning behind the EP, Mokita revealed, “This EP is really just about growing up. I’ve been sober for the past 3 years, so I feel like a lot of the songs I had been writing were tied up into trying to figure out what it looks like to really live life to the fullest. I had started looking at a lot of the questions that I had been putting off for most of my life. ‘Color Me In’, ‘Figure Me Out’ and ‘Happiness’ are all sort of an amalgamation of those thoughts and are steeped in some deeper content that I haven’t really written about before. I had written about depression and breakups and anxiety a lot before this batch of songs, but I really love writing about the things I’m going through currently. One of the things that was tough for me when I first quit drinking was just trying to figure out how to spend my nights. You get in the habit of going out every night and then all of sudden when you quit doing that you realize you don’t know what to do. I was just bored. So, I started reading a lot more and actually diving into what I believed, who I wanted to be as a person and really chased after that. I wanted to be able to write about my doubts just as I wanted to write about things I knew for certain. Most of this EP was born out of conversations. There is so much about life that I don’t have figured out, and that is where most of the songwriting inspiration came from. A lot of my approach to writing these songs was new to me, and so I wanted to get out of my comfort zone when it came to production as well. Since a lot of the lyrical content was a little deeper, I wanted the songs to feel more intimate and personal.”
On the heels of next month’s EP release, Mokita will be supporting indie rock band Augustana on select dates in November for their “Everyday an Eternity Tour.”
Tour Dates:
*supporting Augustana
11/1: Charlotte, NC @ Evening Muse*
11/2: Ashville, NC @ The Grey Eagle*
11/3: Atlanta, GA @ City Winery*
11/11: Franklin, TN @ Franklin Theatre*