Today, following a stunning performance on The Kelly Clarkson Show, Hurray for the Riff Raff has released an official music video for their song, "Buffalo." One of many moving highlights from The Past Is Still Alive, the 2024 Nonesuch album that Pitchfork just declared one of the best of the decade thus far, "Buffalo" is a love song about survival, patience, miracles and memories of real people and places that bandleader Alynda Segarra (they/them) experienced during trips to New Mexico. In the video, directed by The Past Is Still Alive collaborator Jeff Perlman, Segarra takes over the Field Museum in their brand new home of Chicago, roams alongside a herd of wild buffalo, and shines a light on extinct and endangered species.
Watch the music video for "Buffalo," and see Hurray for the Riff Raff perform the song on a new episode of The Kelly Clarkson Show, where Clarkson notes that Segarra is "often called one of the best songwriters in the country"
In recent weeks, Alynda Segarra performed "Buffalo" on the stage of the Ryman Auditorium at the Americana Honors & Awards, where The Past Is Still Alive was nominated for Album of the Year. They have also performed music from The Past Is Still Alive on Austin City Limits and CBS Saturday Morning, and at a sold-out GRAMMY Museum program in New York City, hosted by poet and journalist Hanif Abdurraqib. As The New York Times says, Segarra continues "etching their own story into the American songbook, and asserting that they belong."
"I wrote 'Buffalo' about trying to keep a relationship alive in a fast-paced modern world where love can feel like it’s on the endangered species list. On a rare night off of tour last month, we took over the Field Museum in Chicago. Hanging with long gone creatures from ages ago and eventually ending up on a wagon ride with a herd in Indiana. Making this video with The Past Is Still Alive's visual director Jeff Perlman was an adventure"
-Alynda Segarra
Hailed as "the next great American road album" (Atlantic) – with fans ranging from Elton John to Eileen Myles – The Past Is Still Alive is a memoir and map of the country's fringes, packing profound stories and poignant reflections into the type of poetic lyrics and unforgettable melodies that make up three-minute masterstrokes like "Buffalo," "Alibi," "Colossus of Roads," "Hawkmoon" and more. Whether Alynda Segarra is singing about dumpster diving for dinner or making love on superfund sites, train-hopping across the country or outrunning cops on empty highways, reckoning with the recent passing of their father or fondly remembering the first trans woman they ever met, The Past Is Still Alive highlights what has earned them praise as "one of America's best songwriters" (Vulture) and "one of their generation's most fearless folk-rock storytellers" (Pitchfork).
Listen to The Past Is Still Alive via Nonesuch, and dive deeper into the album at Resist Psychic Death, the new publication Segarra launched last month via Substack
On the heels of dozens of sold-out tour dates, a run of shows with Norah Jones, appearances at Aspen Ideas Fest and beyond, Hurray for the Riff Raff is back on the road this fall, with performances in the US and abroad. Find them listed here.
