It’s felt like a particularly long wait for the follow-up to Weyes Blood’s breakthrough 2019 LP Titanic Rising not just because the record was so powerful in its proficient songwriting, immaculate production, and prescient timeliness—but also because it arrived as a sort of cliffhanger introducing a trilogy of albums. Three years later and Natalie Mering is revealing the next chapter of that series with And in the Darkness, Hearts Glow, an album that shifts the mood from pending apocalypse to coping with what could maybe be described as, hmm, the “new normal.” “We’re in a fully functional shit show,” Mering shared in an open letter. “My heart is a glow stick that’s been cracked, lighting up my chest in an explosion of earnestness.”
Arriving November 18 via Sub Pop, the record was mostly produced by Mering and Jonathan Rado, and teases features from Oneohtrix Point Never, Hand Habits, and Mary Lattimore. The first single is a sonic expansion of the sounds of her previous album, stretching those lush, baroque-pop instrumentals and Rado’s familiar pattering drums to a nearly epic six minutes.
You can hear that track and read the full aforementioned open letter below, and check out her newly revealed spring tour dates here.
