Yesterday (per Stereogum), The Shins announced some details regarding the release of their forthcoming new album. And everyone was all like, “whoa, I totally love these details; they really speak to me intellectually but are also just plain fun!” Everything was totally cool, and all was right with art, business, and music. The end. …Except then, right after that, front man James Mercer totally fucking fired the shit out of those attention-hogging, creative control-grubbing details and hired all new ones. But, uh, okay. Now that he’s satisfied, here they are:
The new album — the band’s first since 2007’s Wincing the Night Away (TMT Review) is called Port of Morrow (yeah, pretty Shins-y) and was produced by Greg Kurstin (Lily Allen, The Bird and the Bee, Kylie Minogue). …Except that right after Kurstin was done producing it, Mercer totally fucking fired his ass from having produced half of it and listed himself as co-producer. Uh, yeah… suffice it to say, Mercer also played most of the instruments himself, probably firing songs one-by-one as he finished recording them. He’s been playing some new songs live recently, as you can see in the video below. (FYI, everyone at that show was later fired as a fan by Mercer.)
Port of Morrow is due this March via Columbia/Aural Apothecary. It was due in February originally, but… well, you know.
Port of Morrow tracklisting:
01. The Rifle’s Spiral
02. Simple Song
03. It’s Only Life
04. No Way Down
05. September
06. Bait and Switch
07. Fall of ’82
08. For a Fool
09. 40 Mark Strasse
10. Port of Morrow
• The Shins: http://www.theshins.com
• Columbia: http://www.columbiarecords.com
• Aural Apothecary: http://www.facebook.com/Aural.Apothecary
