THE NEW PORNOGRAPHERS - CONTINUE AS A GUEST
LABEL : MERGE // RELEASE DATE : MARCH 31, 2023
Continue as a Guest, the new album from The New Pornographers, is set for release on March 31 via Merge Records—their first for the label.
A.C. Newman began work on Continue as a Guest at his Woodstock, New York home over the course of a year, after the band had just finished touring behind 2019’s In The Morse Code Of Brake Lights. During the writing and recording process, he discovered new lyrical, artistic and sonic approaches experimenting with his own vocal register.
The 10-track record is produced by Newman and features compatriots Neko Case, Kathryn Calder, John Collins, Todd Fancey, and Joe Seiders as well as contributions from saxophonist Zach Djanikian and in addition to the Bejar co-write, glimmering track "Firework in the Falling Snow" was co-penned by Sadie Dupuis (Speedy Ortiz, Sad13).
The album tackles themes of isolation and collapse, following the ambivalence of day-to-day life during the pandemic and the endless pitfalls of living online. But Newman says that Continue as a Guest’s title track also addresses the continually rolling concerns that come with being in a band for so long. “The idea of continuing as a guest felt very apropos to the times,” he explains. “Feeling out of place in culture, in society—not feeling like a part of any zeitgeist, but happy to be separate and living your simple life, your long fade-out. Find your own little nowhere, find some space to fall apart, continue as a guest.”
The New Pornographers have previously released eight studio albums, including their classic debut, Mass Romantic, reissued in 2021 to celebrate the 21st anniversary of its premiere. Their latest, In The Morse Code Of Brake Lights, debuted at #2 on the Billboard Alternative Chart, #6 on the Billboard Rock Chart and #15 on the Billboard Album Chart. It was hailed as “infectious” by NPR, while Rolling Stone praised “the Canadian power-pop crew keeps cranking out songs where the hooks-per-minute ratio is almost unseemly.”
CONTINUE AS A GUEST
01 Really Really Light
02 Pontius Pilate’s Home Movies
03 Cat and Mouse with the Light
04 Last and Beautiful
05 Continue as a Guest
06 Bottle Episodes
07 Marie and the Undersea
08 Angelcover
09 Firework in the Falling Snow
10 Wish Automatic Suite
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