Spanish Love Songs, my favourite emo-punk band, have announced a new album – and released its first single.
Haunted is the first taste of No Joy, the fourth album from the Los Angeles five-piece, due out on 25 August on Pure Noise Records.
The album is the highly anticipated follow-up to 2020’s critically acclaimed Brave Faces Everyone, which – combined with a UK tour with The Menzingers (see our live review here) – introduced them to a much wider audience.
Formed in 2013, Spanish Love Songs had gained a cult following with their deeply personal existential dread-steeped 2015 debut album Giant Sings The Blues and the follow-up Schmaltz three years later.
“Haunted is a reintroduction of sorts for us,” explains vocalist and guitarist Dylan Slocum. “It lays out exactly the band we are at the moment, and after nine months of writing and recording we knew it had to be the first to come out.”
No Joy is the sound of Slocum, his wife and keyboardist Meredith Van Woert, guitarist Kyle McAulay, bassist Trevor Dietrich, and drummer Ruben Duarte finding peace in quieter moments and embracing the negative space.
“This is the closest we’ve ever gotten to figuring out how to translate what I hear in my head with more clarity,” Slocum says.
Produced by the band and Collin Pastore (Lucy Dacus, Julien Baker, Illuminati Hotties), No Joy‘s 12 tracks continue to find Spanish Love Songs grappling with the messiness of what it means to be alive in the modern age.
As Slocum says, “it’s an album about finding happiness in what you have and your current moment. It might be your best moment, or it might not, but you have to find joy in it.”
Spanish Love Songs play a sold-out show in London on 26 May before appearing at Slam Dunk on 27-28 May. They also recently announced an autumn UK tour with Michigan emo types Hot Mulligan from 31 August to 8 September.
News of the album comes hot on the heels of the Doom & Gloom Sessions, which saw Spanish Love Songs put their own stamp on songs by some of their favourite bands.
Artists covered include The Killers, Rilo Kiley, Jimmy Eat World, Grandaddy and Blink-182. Check them out on Bandcamp HERE.
