I Inside the Old Year Dying will be Harvey’s tenth studio album, released on 7 July via Partisan Records.
It marks the illustrious musician and songwriter’s first full-length album since 2016’s The Hope Six Demolition Project, which picked up a Grammy nomination for Best Alternative Music Album and debuted at Number One in the UK Charts.
The same team produces the forthcoming record, consisting of PJ Harvey’s long-time collaborators Flood (real name, Mark Ellis) and John Parish.
Today’s single release, the haunting ‘A Child’s Question, August’, arrives with an equally sparse yet arresting video directed by Steve Gullick – which you can watch below.
The inception of the forthcoming album began where the previous one left off; Harvey was nearing the end of her tour support for The Hope Six Demolition Project when she felt the endless cycles of albums and tours had ironically cut her off from the connection with the music itself.
Following a meeting with acclaimed director Steve McQueen, who imparted some creative wisdom to pare things back to their bare essentials – words, images and music – and following and reconjuring her own love for playing live, Harvey refound her connection.
In fact, Harvey has said the new songs “all came out of me in about three weeks”.
After hunkering down with her longstanding creative pair of Flood and Parish at North West London’s Battery Studios, the record was brought to life.
Photo: Steve Gullick
“I think the album is about searching, looking – the intensity of first love, and seeking meaning,” Harvey has added.
“Not that there has to be a message, but the feeling I get from the record is one of love – it’s tinged with sadness and loss, but it’s loving. I think that’s what makes it feel so welcoming: so open.”
