British band Foals’ hew album will be a “more extreme” affair, according to lead singer Yannis Phillippakis. We’re yet to hear music from the upcoming album, a follow-up to 2013’s acclaimed Holy Fire (which brought us the groovy My Number,) but the singer revealed a few things in a recent interview with Q Magazine; “We felt that the spread on Holy Fire was good but on this we wanted to push it out even further, so the extremes were further apart. The heavier songs are heavier, the poppy songs are poppier and weirder.”
Guitarist Jimmy Smith went on to speak about their time working in the south of France, with producer James Ford. “We drank about 130 bottles of this red wine called Ardèche,” he says, “[but] I don’t think there was a point where we were all drunk.”
Last October, the band posted a photo on Instagram of a guitar and keyboard with the caption “It starts…”. Now, almost eight months and 91 litres of wine later, they’re finally closer to completing the album.
While Holy Fire saw the band travel to a slew of remote and “ludicrous” recording locations including Gothenburg, Sweden, the new material has been recorded in the safety of their London studios.
Foals last visited Australia almost a year ago, in a last-minute headlining slot at Splendour In The Grass (filling in for late cancellation Two Door Cinema Club.) They’re set for a lineup of European festival gigs later this year, where they’ll no doubt be previewing tracks from their upcoming album.