It seems that we are going to have to wish an ever-underrated staple of Canadian indie rock goodbye soon. Frog Eyes have announced their ostensible final record, Violet Psalms, Pitchfork reports. It’s out May 18. There’s been no word as to why the band, which has always had a rotating lineup outside of singer/songwriter Carey Mercer and drummer Melanie Campbell (also Mercer’s wife), is splitting. “We were trying to pretend it was our first record when there’s no expectation that anyone will actually listen,” Mercer said in a statement.
The first single, “Idea Man,” is overall an unusually sunny, jangly outing for the band, pitting sticky little snippets of melody against a restlessly mutating song structure. It ends with a somber section, dominated by more brassy ululations from Mercer. In other words, it’s a pretty good distillation of Frog Eyes’ different musical modes.
Frog Eyes have also announced a series of farewell tour dates in North America. Check those out and listen to “Idea Man” below.
https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/tracks/387447095%3Fsecret_token%3Ds-TtF4u&color=%23ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false&show_teaser=true&visual=true
Also Read
Frog Eyes – “Your Boss’s Shirt”
5/11 Kamloops, British Columbia – TBA ^
5/12 Kelowna, British Columbia – Milkcrate Records ^
5/18 Toronto, Ontario – The Handlebar ^
5/19 Montreal, Quebec – Bar le “Ritz” PDB ^
5/20 Ottawa, Ontario – The Warehouse ^
5/21 Hamilton, Ontario – Mill’s Hardware ^
5/25 Victoria, British Columbia – Copper Owl ^
5/26 Vancouver, British Columbia – China Cloud ^
6/29 Bellingham, WA – Shakedown Tavern ^
6/30 Portland, OR – The Bunk Bar ^
7/1 Seattle, WA – Sunset Tavern ^
7/3 Los Angeles, CA – The Moroccan Lounge ^$
7/5 San Francisco, CA – Bottom of the Hill ^$
7/7 Brooklyn, NY – Elsewhere: Zone One ^%
7/8 Philadelphia, PA – Johnny Brenda’s ^
7/9 Washington, DC – DC9 Club ^
^ with Hello Blue Roses
$ with The Skygreen Leopards
% with Zachary Cale
