Japandroids Announce Final Album, Share New Single ‘Chicago’

The ten-track album comes seven years after the band’s last LP, Near To the Wild Heart of Life.

Image by Dan Monick

Vancouver duo Japandroids are calling it a day with their fourth album, Fate & Alcohol. Following on from 2017s underrated Near To the Wild Heart of Life, the band’s final LP is out October 18 via Anti- and features ten tracks, including first single, ‘Chicago’.

Recorded in Vancouver with longtime collaborator Jesse Gander, Fate & Alcohol finds Brian King (guitar, vocals) and David Prowse (drums, vocals) returning to the raw and rugged sound of their earlier work.

“On our last record we wanted to broaden the definition of a Japandroids song, and purposely left our demos quite open and malleable so that we had more flexibility to experiment in the studio,” King says in a statement regarding their final album.

“At the time, this approach was new and exciting, and inspired us to be bolder, to take more chances. We were aiming for a more cinematic take on our signature sound. This time, we made certain that every song ripped in our jam space before [longtime recording engineer] Jesse [Gander] ever heard it. If you listen to our first demo of ‘Chicago’, it’s obviously much rougher than what you hear on record, but it's all there. Even on a blown-out iPhone recording, the energy was obvious, and the feeling cut through loud and clear.”

Listen to ‘Chicago’ below.

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Japandroids met as students at the University of Victoria in British Columbia in 2006. Relocating to Vancouver, the duo released their debut album Post-Nothing to critical acclaim in 2009, with Pitchfork’s Ian Cohen writing the band “makes terminally catchy music played with punk's enthusiasm and velocity that makes you feel like joining in to bash along” in his glowing review of the album.

They followed Post-Nothing with the commercially successful Celebration Rock in 2012, an album that also received high praise and topped many end-of-year best lists. The lads embarked on an extensive world tour in support of the album, performing a whopping 500 shows in 44 countries. Japandroids took several years off after the tour ended before returning in 2017 with Near to the Wild Heart of Life.

Addressing their legacy in a statement, the band is measured in their response. “I don't think we're the most technically proficient band in the world,” Prowse says. “And we're not the most original-sounding or challenging band in the world. But we've always put a lot of passion into what we do, and I think that's resonated with a lot of people. And I'm really grateful that we could be that band for people, in the same way that so many bands were for us.” 

Fate & Alcohol is released October 18 via Anti-. You can pre-order your copy here and check out the album artwork and tracklist below.

Fate & Alcohol

1. Eye Contact High

2. D&T

3. Alice

4. Chicago

5. Upon Sober Reflection

6. Fugitive Summer

7. A Gaslight Anthem

8. Positively 34th Street

9. One Without the Other

10. All Bets Are Off

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