BADBADNOTGOOD Announce New Album 'Talk Memory'

The trio's fifth full-length features Terrace Martin, Karriem Riggins, Laraaji, Arthur Verocai and Brandee Younger

BY Calum SlingerlandPublished Jul 15, 2021

BADBADNOTGOOD have returned with details of their fifth studio album. The Toronto trio will share Talk Memory on October 8 through XL Recordings.

Talk Memory finds drummer Alexander Sowinski, bassist Chester Hansen and guitar/woodwind player Leland Whitty collaborating with Arthur Verocai, Karriem Riggins, Terrace Martin, Laraaji and Brandee Younger (Makaya McCraven, Moses Sumney). The album artwork seen above comes courtesy of Virgil Abloh's Alaska-Alaska design firm.

The nine-song set is said to focus on "collaboration and the magic of improvised live performance" through the trio paying homage to the musicians, composers and influences that first informed their work. 

"It took a year or two of just living life to get to the place where the creative process was exciting again and once we actually went in to the studio it was the most concise recording and writing process we've ever had," BBNG shared of their latest. "We hope that the improvised studio performances bring the listener closer to our live experience."

Album opener "Signal from the Noise" is the first song to arrive from the effort, complete with a Duncan Loudon-directed video starring People Just Do Nothing's Steve Stamp. BBNG had previously shared the song's sheet music, allowing fans and friends like Harrison and the Kount to interpret the single themselves ahead of its launch.

That sheet music and more exclusive content will be included in companion print series The Memory Catalogue, which will see release alongside each piece of new music to contextualize Talk Memory. You can find out where to pick up The Memory Catalogue through the band's official website.

Talk Memory follows BADBADNOTGOOD's acclaimed 2016 outing IV. It was shortlisted for the 2017 Polaris Music Prize and landed among Exclaim!'s Top 15 Soul and R&B albums of 2016.

More recently, Exclaim! named IV one of the 50 Best Canadian Albums of the 2010s, while its Charlotte Day Wilson-assisted "In Your Eyes" was named one of the 50 Best Canadian Songs of the 2010s.

Last year, Whitty and drummer Alexander Sowinski told Exclaim! that their work scoring Canadian thriller film Disappearance at Clifton Hill directly informed Talk Memory. The year also saw BADBADNOTGOOD share singles "Goodbye Blue" and "Glide."


Talk Memory:

1. Signal From the Noise
2. Unfolding (Momentum 73) [feat. Laraajii]
3. City of Mirrors (feat. Arthur Verocai)
4. Beside April (feat. Karriem Riggins, Arthur Verocai)
5. Love Proceeding (feat. Arthur Verocai)
6. Open Channels **
7. Timid, Intimidating
8. Beside April Reprise (feat. Arthur Verocai)
9. Talk Meaning (feat. Arthur Verocai, Terrace Martin and Brandee Younger)

** physical only

Pre-order Talk Memory.

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