The project is set for release on August 23 via XL, with the Irish quintet also sharing a music video for new single Starbuster.
Irish quintet Fontaines D.C. have announced their fourth album ROMANCE, which is set to be released on August 23.
The follow up to 2022’s Skinty Fia will be the group’s first release with XL Recordings, and will be produced by Simian Mobile Disco’s James Ford, whose recent credits include work with Beth Gibbons, Blur and Depeche Mode.
They have also shared the first single from the album, Starbuster, along with a new music video directed by Aube-Perrier. Chaotic and sharp, before clearing towards the end, the track was inspired by a panic attack experienced by the band’s lead singer Grian Chatten in London’s St Pancras Station.
Speaking about the album’s title, Fontaines D.C.’s bassist Conor Deegan said: “We’ve always had this sense of idealism and romance. Each album gets further away from observing that through the lens of Ireland, as directly as [debut] Dogrel. The second album [A Hero’s Death] is about that detachment, and the third [Skinty Fia] is about Irishness dislocated in the diaspora. Now we look to where and what else there is to be romantic about.”
Take a listen to Starbuster below, and read our 2022 profile of the band here.
Full tracklist for ROMANCE:
- Romance
- Starburster
- Here’s The Thing
- Desire
- In The Modern World
- Bug
- Motorcycle Boy
- Sundowner
- Horseness is the Whatness
- Death Kink
- Favourite