After teasing some new material earlier this year, Parquet Courts are officially back. The group announced their first album in three years, Sympathy for Life, which they say is inspired by New York clubs, Primal Scream and Pink Floyd.
“Most of the songs were created by taking long improvisations and moulding them through our own editing,” co-frontman Austin Brown said in a statement. “The biggest asset we have as artists is the band. After 10 years together, our greatest instrument is each other. The purest expression of Parquet Courts is when we are improvising.
“Sympathy For Life is influenced by the party itself,” he added.
You can hear the first officially released song, “Walking at a Downtown Pace,” and watch a video directed by Daniel Arnold.
Co-frontman A Savage says the clip shows New York City “from the vantage point of someone busily hurrying through it.” The statement continues, “That’s what life can be like here; a world of constant motion surrounds you while you’re just walking toward where you need to be. There’s a lot of beauty that can be missed, and it wasn’t until the streets were virtually empty that I did miss it. The song was written before all quarantine, but eerily enough the lyrics echo that longing. Now the city is back and, so it seems, are Parquet Courts.”
Check it out below.
Parquet Courts’ Sympathy for Life is out on Oct. 22 via Rough Trade Records. Check out the full tracklisting below.
Sympathy For Life Tracklisting:
1. Walking At A Downtown Pace
2. Black Widow Spider
3. Marathon of Anger
4. Just Shadows
5. Plant Life
6. Application Apparatus
7. Homo Sapien
8. Sympathy For Life
9. Zoom Out
10. Trullo
11. Pulcinella