“just having sent the last files to mastering, album ready…!”
In a new piece written for W Magazine, Björk reveals that her forthcoming album, Utopia, is now complete. Stating that she has “been in the studio a little too long”, she begins the article with: “sooo i’m all sleepy but happy here, just having sent the last files to mastering, album ready…!”
She details her working relationship with Alejandro Ghersi, aka Arca, who’s co-produced the new album. “at the end of vulnicura i felt a deep musical connection with him,” she says, “i felt guilty having dragged him through such a dramatic and difficult subject matter and that we had earned a lightness.”
She details the trust they’ve developed and segues on to a discussion about sexism in the music industry: “i can merge with a male producer and not be paranoid about being typecast as just the vocalist and so on.”
“because like all justice battles, black rights are not about isolating black people but that they can live in a society with white people but still keep same strength. same with women. i’m not sure how much it helps to isolate. i think it is important now that everyone is more aware of the culprits of sexism, we should be able to embrace collaborations and guys don’t get all the credit,” she writes.
Furthermore, she adds that Utopia is her invented world, created as a response to current political climates and living in a Trump era. “i feel in this time of trump it is a necessity to have a plan, a manifesto, an alternative,” she says.
Utopia is due out in November, though the specific date is yet to be confirmed. So far, the Icelandic icon has dropped a visual for The Gate, a single from the new album. The video was a collaboration with visual artist Andrew Thomas Huang, Alessandro Michele and James Mersey. She’s previously described her highly anticipated release as her “Tinder album”.
Read the full interview here.
Revisit Crack’s cover story with Björk.