Edinburgh-based Young Fathers will follow up 2014’s Mercury Music Prize-winning debut full-length Dead with second album White Men Are Black Men Too, out on April 6. The trio are previewing its release with album track ‘Rain Or Shine’, which is available for a limited time as a free download to people signing up to their mailing list or to purchase from iTunes – stream it above.
A rather eye-opening press release attached to the album’s announcement includes the following: "The sounds are closer on this album, closer to your ears. It sounds as if you are in the room during the recording, possibly experience a little existential trauma, but not enough that you don’t notice an ear worm hook when you hear one. These hooks, they stay with you." As for the album’s title, the group’s label have offered an extract from an e-mail chain between Young Fathers and management which sees the band’s Alloysious Massaquoi passionately explain his reasoning for going ahead with it. Massaquoi says: "I’m aware of the points we’ve discussed but all that sounds like to me is, we are trying to cater to what other people might think, as if it’s a negative thing, which it’s not. We came at it from a different angle, a positive angle. It’s got issues of race and so what? Why should alarm bells start ringing, even though in general conversations race, politics, sex and religion are always the subject matter? Why should it be discussed behind closed doors and never confronted head on?"
Young Fathers will tour in support of White Men Are Black Men Too with US and UK dates starting in New York on April 10 and finishing in Liverpool on June 7. The tour will take in shows at Glasgow’s Art School, May 20, London’s Koko, May 28, Sheffield’s O2 Academy 2, June 6 and a number of other UK towns and cities. Full ticket and date details for the tour can be found here. Listen to December’s single ‘Soon Come Soon’ below:
