Damon Albarn has announced details of his new solo album ‘The Nearer The Fountain, More Pure The Stream Flows’. Check out the title track below, along with a short excerpt of our interview with Albarn.
After announcing that he’d be signing to Transgressive Records to release the follow-up to his 2014 solo debut ‘Everday Robots‘ and debuting a number of the tracks at Glastonbury’s Live At Worthy Farm livestream last month, now the Blur and Gorillaz frontman has announced that his new full-length effort will arrive on November 12.
The album started life in 2019 as an orchestral project and live experience, inspired by the landscapes of Iceland, before Albarn returned to the music in lockdown to develop the work into 11 tracks which “further explore themes of fragility, loss, emergence and rebirth”. The title is taken from a John Clare poem entitled Love and Memory.
“[Iceland] is a nice place to meditate on the elements and particles,” Albarn told NME. “I’d been dreaming on making music while looking out of that window, when my friend from the Lyon Festival offered me the very tempting proposition of ‘You can do whatever you want’. I had immediately had something that I never thought would be feasible, so I organised musicians, string players, three bass trombones, some percussion and keyboards into an interesting arrangement.”
“I wanted to see where that would take me. Sometimes it took me down to Uruguay and Montevideo. Other times I went to Iran, Iceland or Devon. With travel being curtailed, it was kind of nice to be able to make a record that put me strangely in those places for a moment or two.”
Check back at NME soon for more of our interview with Albarn.
The album will be released digitally on November 12, along with limited edition colour vinyl formats, plus CD and cassette, as well as a deluxe version with a casebound book featuring additional photography, original scanned lyrics and artwork from Albarn, alongside a clear vinyl version of the album, a high quality digital file and a bonus 7” featuring an exclusive song from the recording sessions. Pre-order it here.
The tracklist for the album is:
‘The Nearer The Fountain, More Pure The Stream Flows’
‘The Cormorant’
‘Royal Morning Blue’
‘Combustion’
‘Daft Wader’
‘Darkness To Light’
‘Esja’
‘The Tower Of Montevideo’
‘Giraffe Trumpet Sea’
‘Polaris’
‘Particles’
Tour dates
Meanwhile, Albarn’s upcoming solo tour dates are as follows. Visit here for tickets and more information.
FEBRUARY 2022
21-22 February: London (Barbican)
23-24 February: Dublin (National Concert Hall)
26: Luxembourg (Philharmonie)
28: Brussels (Bozar)
MARCH 2022
1: Brussels (Bozar)
2: Eindhoven (Muziekgebouw)
4-5: Paris (Philharmonie)
6: Lyon (Auditorium)
7: Hamburg (ElbPhilharmonie)
9: Copenhagen (KB Hallen)
11: Reykjavik (Harpa)
Gorillaz meanwhile, have been confirmed to headline Boardmasters this August, as well as performing at Primavera Sound 2022.
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