Cate Le Bon announces Pompeii, her sixth full-length studio album, out February 4th, 2022 on Mexican Summer. In conjunction, she presents its lead single/video, “Running Away,”(below) and shares dates for her North American, European, and UK tour.
The songs of Pompeii, the follow up to 2019’s Mercury-nominated Reward, feel suspended in time, both of the moment and instant but reactionary and Dada-esque in their insistence to be playful, satirical, and surreal. Songs built for Now miraculously germinate from Le Bon’s interests in antiquity, philosophy, architecture, and divinity’s modalities. A global pandemic plus climate emergency’s colliding eco-traumas resonate all too eerily. “What would be your last gesture?” she asks. But Pompeii reaches past the current crises to tap into what Le Bon calls “an economy of time warp” where life roils, bubbles, wrinkles, melts, hardens, and reconfigures unpredictably, like lava—or sound, rather.
Written primarily on bass and composed entirely alone in an “uninterrupted vacuum,” Le Bon plays every instrument (except drums and saxophones) and recorded the album largely by herself with long-term collaborator and co-producer Samur Khouja in Cardiff, Wales. Enforced time and space pushed boundaries, leading to an even more extreme version of Le Bon’s studio process – as exits were sealed, she granted herself “permission to annihilate identity.”
Pompeii Tracklist
1. Dirt on the Bed
2. Moderation
3. French Boys
4. Pompeii
5. Harbour
6. Running Away
7. Cry Me Old Trouble
8. Remembering Me
9. Wheel
Cate Le Bon 2022 Tour Dates
Sun. Feb. 6 – Woodstock, NY @ Colony #
Tue. Feb. 8 – New York, NY @ Bowery Ballroom #
Wed. Feb. 9 – New York, NY @ Bowery Ballroom #
Fri. Feb. 11 – Toronto, ON @ Great Hall #
Mon. Feb. 14 – Chicago, IL @ Thalia Hall #
Wed. Feb. 16 – Portland, OR @ Wonder Ballroom #
Thu. Feb. 17 – Seattle, WA @ Crocodile #
Sun. Feb. 20 – San Luis Obispo, CA @ The Rock / SLO Brew Music Hall #
Thu. Feb. 24 – Los Angeles, CA @ Teragram Ballroom #
Sat. Feb. 26 – Pioneertown, CA @ Pappy’s #
Mon. March 14 – Southampton, UK @ Engine Rooms #
Tue. March 15 – London, UK @ Hackney Empire #
Wed. March 16 – Manchester, UK @ Albert Hall #
Thu. March 17 – Glasgow, UK @ SWG3 TV Studio #
Fri. March 18 – Belfast, UK @ Empire Music Hall #
Sat. March 19 – Dublin, IE @ The National Concert Hall #
Mon. March 21 – Liverpool, UK @ Arts Club #
Tue. March 22 – Leeds, UK @ Irish Centre #
Wed. March 23 – Birmingham, UK @ The Mill #
Mon. March 28 – Lille, FR @ L’Aeronef #
Tue. March 29 – Paris, FR @ La Maroquinerie #
Thu. March 31 – Lyon, FR @ Epicerie Moderne #
Fri. April 1 – Zurich, CH @ Bogen F #
Sat. April 2 – Schorndorf, DE @ Manufaktur #
Sun. April 3 – Leipzig, DE @ UT Connewitz #
Tue. April 5 – Berlin, DE @ Frannz Club #
Wed. April 6 – Hamburg, DE @ Nochtspeicher #
Thu. April 7 – Hus 7 / Slaktkyrkan @ Stockholm, SE #
Fri. April 8 – Oslo, NO @ Parkteatret #
Sat. April 9 – Copenhagen, DK @ Vega #
Mon. April 11 – Brussels, BE @ AB Box #
Tue. April 12 – Amsterdam, NL @ Paradiso #
# = with Mega Bog
