The Avalanches have shared the joyously nostalgic single ‘Together’, featuring Nikki Nair, Jessy Lanza and Prentiss – listen below.
The Melbourne electronic ‘plunderphonics’ group have not released any new music since their third album ‘We Will Always Love You’ in 2020, itself the follow-up to 2016’s ‘Wildflower’, their return after 16 years away.
Now, they are back with a new single, which is thought to be the first taste of a fourth album from the band. The infectiously energetic track explores the aching warmth of the nature of memory, with Jessy Lanza singing: “You only know the picture me, the one that smiles with hope / You could never picture me at home, crying over my telephone / I’ll never be the picture me, the me I love the most / Staring at a picture on my phone, staring at a memory that’s gone”.
It comes along with a simple video showing a floppy disk and an iPod galloping forward in front of a sun that rises and sets with alarming regularity. Watch here:
NME spoke to The Avalanches in 2020 about the legacy of their landmark 2000 debut album ‘Since I Left You’.
“‘Since I Left You’s shadow got bigger and bigger every year,” Tony Di Blasi said.
“I still remember four years [after it was released] my girlfriend at the time said, ‘You know people say it’s a really classic record?’” Robbie Chater added. “I’d never heard anybody say that. I just heard all the shit I should’ve done better.”
“Now it’s 20, the little kid’s all grown up!” Di Blasi exclaimed.
“I have a great relationship with the album now,” Chater continued. “It sounds like a very young me made it. It’s naïve, heart-on-sleeve, it was never cool or ironic. It was passionate, of the moment, full of joy.”
Last year, The Avalanches contributed tracks to Massive Attack’s ‘Piccadilly Un:Plugged’ installation in London, and in 2024, they collaborated with Jamie xx for his single ‘All You Children’, a follow-on from their previous work together on ‘Wherever You Go’ from ‘We Will Always Love You’.