The Horrors have announced details of their upcoming album whilst releasing a new track, titled ‘I See You’.
So what do we know? Well, the new album will be called Luminous and it’s been given a May 5th release date. Lead singer Faris Badwan spoke to the NME on the band’s fourth album, their first since 2011’s Skying: “This is the album I’ve been most excited about releasing. I think it would be misleading to say it’s got more guitars or more synths, because half the time the guitars sound like synths anyway. Is it fair to say there’s more of everything?”
What of ‘I See You’? A new Horrors track will be high on the list of most anticipated songs this year, partially down to the long wait we’ve had since Skying, partially because they’re the most innovative and forward thinking contemporary British band. It starts off relatively clear-headed with Faris crooning about summertime. Despite the feedback and other distortions going on in the background, hallmarks of any Horrors track, the chorus is poppy, almost Britpoppy, and there seems to be a shift in mood from the Southend-band.
If the song finished on 3:45 it’d be a solid, if unspectacular return. Potential, but no evidence of clear results. All in all it’d be pretty disappointing, but you’d cling to the hope that it’ll grow on you. Thankfully the track stretches on for another three more minutes, and it’s in those incredible minutes that we discover what the band have been doing for these past years.
It gazes along, spiralling and snowballing, somehow becoming more and more faster, louder, more intense. Utterly gripping, it transfixes you until the very end. Adding to that, the video that started off as a mere lyric one, becomes increasingly surreal and frantic to match the hellish crescendo.
Right now May seems like a long way away, but these seven and a half minutes it might just make it come a little quicker.
Listen below:
Andrew J Skinner 