Two years ago, Tune-Yards were busy. In 2018, the wild, ecstatic indie rock duo came out with the album i can feel you creep into my private life, and they also scored the great Boots Riley film Sorry To Bother You. The duo hasn’t exactly been silent since then. Earlier this year, for instance, frontwoman Merrill Garbus showed up on a couple of tracks from Quelle Chris and Chris Keys’ collaborative album Innocent Country 2. And you can hear echoes of Tune-Yards, if you’re looking for them, in something like Fiona Apple’s Fetch The Bolt Cutters. But today, we get to hear the first new Tune-Yards single since 2018.
The new Tune-Yards single is called “nowhere, man” — a Beatles reference, obviously, but not a Beatles cover. The new song is a giddy frenzy built on a tumbling breakbeat, and it sounds defiantly and hearteningly ’90s. There’s also a video. Directors Japhy Riddle and Callie Day added stop-motion animation after filming in Merrill Garbus and Nate Brenner’s garage, and it features Garbus doing Chaplin-style physical comedy. Check it out below.
In a press release, Garbus says:
The song and the video for “nowhere, man” were created under conditions of feeling squeezed and pushed to the brink — relatively, of course. I wanted to ask, “How loudly do I have to shout and sing before I’m heard?” And the video asks, too, “What am I not hearing?” We hope the music brings energy and a strong wind of encouragement to those who are shouting and singing loudly for justice right now.
“nowhere, man” is out now on 4AD.
