Glass Animals are one of the best bands out now. They're uniquely musical, creating lush soundscapes that you can lose yourself and then replay again and again until you've found yourself (maybe). The music bleeds into pop, electronic, r'n'b and sometimes even hip-hop territory-- and they're no strangers to collaborating with rappers, most recently, including Denzel Curry on their "Tokyo Drifting" record, but they've also linked with Joey Bada$$ and others.
While we've been in quarantine, the four-man band, which counts Dave Bayley as the lead singer, have dropped a couple of covers for Nirvana's "Heart Shaped Box" and Lana Del Rey's "Young and Beautiful." Today they're following these up with an original song and an album announcement too-- for the title track, "Dreamland." The song sounds just like-- a sleepy, hazy dream. That description could essentially be applied to any of their records, as they often give lullaby-esque, melodic jams.
"Dreamland" is an exciting taste of the album of the same name. Dave Bayley elaborated on the album's inspiration alongside the news today, saying, "This album goes through many of the most confusing moments in my life. It’s about growing up, from my first memories as a little kid to now. Quite often those moments are funny, sometimes awkward, sometimes heart-breaking, sometimes it’s about love or hate or sexuality. It’s about realising it’s ok to not have answers and it’s ok to not know how you feel about things and that it’s ok to be and look vulnerable. In fact, all of that is quite exciting. So often life asks us for binary yes or no answers. It asks us to conform and to fit in. But the world is so much more interesting and colourful than that…it’s a much more fluid and uncertain place."
He added a few thoughts on how quarantine has derailed his album plans: "I spent weeks devastated that our big plans to bring this album to you in real life on a stage were shattered…but, somehow, in all the uncertainty and before all the unknowns…right now seems like the most insane, but also the most apt time to reveal this record. Growing up is a strange time, the hospital was a strange time and here we are in a strange time again."
The new album, Dreamland, is due out via Republic Records on July 11th. Let us know if you're feeling this woozy r'n'b-ish new single.
Quotable Lyrics
You float in the pool where the soundtrack is Can
You go ask your questions like what makes a man
Oh, it's 2020 so it's time to change that
So you go make an album and call it Dreamland