Noah Kahan was a promising young singer/songwriter with a minor pop hit under his belt -- "Hurt Somebody," a duet with Julia Michaels from his 2019 debut album, Busyhead -- and ambitions of recording a follow-up when the COVID-19 pandemic shut everything down and drove everyone indoors for months. 

Kahan didn't stop working, though. He went north to his parents' house in Vermont and recorded the simple, unadorned and entirely likeable Cape Elizabeth EP, released in May of 2020. The guy's a very good writer so we'll let his original post from noahkahan.com do the talking here:

"Cape Elizabeth was recorded over one week at my friend Phin Choukas’ home studio in Vermont exactly one week after I evacuated New York City due to the Coronavirus. Returning to my parent’s farm home in a town of 1100 people from a three-bedroom apartment in a city 8.3 million felt like I was returning to some part of me I had left behind, a reunion with that obnoxious, ambitious, and totally terrified teenager with some folk songs and an acoustic guitar who first took off for Showbusiness™ in 2015. Throughout this crisis, I’ve spoken to friends who say they feel similarly, like they’re back in high school again, back with their old selves. Long grown and emancipated siblings inhabit their old rooms and settle back into long forgotten routines, family dogs think “what the fuck are you doing here? I don’t see a christmas tree.” We become who we were, for better or for worse. I wanted to do justice to this experience, and create something that felt like who I used to be: a kid at his friends home studio with an acoustic guitar and a story. Free from the shackles of constant analysis and crippling self criticism, unburdened by the never-ending comparison to those around me, I recorded some raw acoustic tunes about worry and departure. I gave myself a one week deadline, and got to work. Hope you enjoy."

TRACKLISTING:

1. A Troubled Mind
2. Close Behind
3. Glue Myself Shut
4. Anyway
5. Maine