Skip to content
News

Death From Above 1979 Announce Return Album ‘The Physical World’

Death From Above 1979 new album

Talk about a pre-sophomore slump: 10 years after the release of their debut album, You’re a Woman I’m a Man, and eight years after their formal split, Death From Above 1979 are finally releasing their second LP, The Physical World. The Toronto synth-punk outfit broke the news on NME, announcing that their next effort would arrive September 9 via Last Gang Records.

“No matter what Jesse [Keeler] and I do, on whatever scale of success it’s sat on, there’s always some kind of reference to Death From Above,” drummer/singer Sebastian Grainger told the publication. “It’s only frustrating because it’s so lazy. So we’re putting out a Death From Above record and if the press is like, ‘It’s not what we expected,’ or however they react to it, it’s like, ‘Well, you’ve been fucking asking for it.'”

Whatever “it” entails, fans have been hoping and possibly expecting this news since DFA 1979 got back together in 2011 (and Grainger announced a solo LPYours to Discover), then thrashed out new material on a string of tour dates the following year. Regarding their reunion, Grainger then wrote on the band’s now-defunct blog, “Jesse and I have been writing new songs and the only way we feel like we can make them any good is to go out and play them for people. We’re going to throw our little muscle bound babies to the lions and see who survives. We tried just jumping into the studio, but the songs lacked spirit. They lacked life.”

According to NME, the new record, produced by Oasis and Noel Gallagher collaborator Dave Sardy, is “Bruce Springsteen meets Sonic Youth”; no mention of any smooth funk perhaps influenced by, say, Chromeo’s “Sexy Socialite,” who DFA 1979 backed up on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon last fall. But, hey, maybe it’s not what we’re expecting.