[1] A former member of Woods and The Babies, Morby has released seven solo studio albums: Harlem River (2013), Still Life (2014), Singing Saw (2016), City Music (2017), Oh My God (2019), Sundowner (2020), and This Is a Photograph (2022).
[7] At the age of 17, Morby dropped out of Blue Valley Northwest High School, got his GED, and moved to Brooklyn, supporting himself by working bike delivery and café jobs.
While living in Brooklyn, he became close friends and roommates with Cassie Ramone of the punk trio Vivian Girls, and the two formed a side project together called The Babies, who released albums in 2011 and 2012.
[9] Following his move to Los Angeles, Morby recorded a collection of songs with Babies producer Rob Barbato that were intended to be an homage to New York City.
Released in 2013 by Woodsist Records, the eight-song collection was called Harlem River and became Morby's debut as a solo artist.
The album also features drummer Justin Sullivan (The Babies) as well as contributions from Will Canzoneri, Tim Presley (White Fence), Dan Iead, and Cate Le Bon.
[11] In 2016, Morby wrote Beautiful Strangers, a protest song in remembrance of Paris 2015 attacks, Orlando 2016 shooting, and death of Freddie Gray.
The digital single, also available as 7” vinyl through Dead Oceans, contained the two songs, “Farewell Transmission” and “The Dark Don’t Hide It”.
The album was released April 26, 2019, via Dead Oceans[19] and was met with wide critical acclaim (19 of 20 published reviews aggregated on Metacritic were scored positive).
[20] It was featured in the April 24, 2019 The Wall Street Journal print edition headlined “Devine Intervention” and called Morby’s best.
[32] In June 2017, Morby officially launched his new label imprint, Mare Records, with the signing of Shannon Lay and announcement of her new LP, Living Water.