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Apr 22, 2020 By Christopher Roberts Sondre Lerche

Norwegian-born/American-based singer/songwriter Sondre Lerche is releasing a new album, Patience, on June 5 via PLZ. Now he has shared another song from it, “Why Would I Let You Go,” via a video for the track. Watch it below.

Previously Lerche shared Patience’s first single, “You Are Not Who I Thought I Was,” via a video for the track.

Lerche has also done a six-song set with the Norwegian Radio Orchestra for NRK-TV, including both the album’s singles thus far. You can watch the performance of “You Are Not Who I Thought I Was” below or you can watch the full set here.

Lerche had this to say about “Why Would I Let You Go” in a press release: “I wrote this in 24 hours spent mostly in bed, in my old apartment in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Writing it felt like a major life event to me. I had never stayed so intensely in the zone of one song or one feeling for so long—and I had never managed to compose such an exact and grand declaration. It was terrifying. I performed it at a few shows in spring of 2016, right after I wrote it. I was finishing the Pleasure album at the time, and I knew this song just wasn’t for that album. It really opened the door for Patience. I didn’t feel ready to record it until three years later. I wasn’t sure if the recording could ever live up to the feeling I had for the song. Even now, four years later, I have trouble performing this song without tearing up. It’s very vivid and dear to me. I’m thankful I got to write it. And if it’s the best song I ever write, I’m ok with that.”

Patience is the follow-up to 2017’s Pleasure and 2014’s Please (you can sense a pattern with the titles). It is Lerche’s ninth album and first since he relocated from New York City (where he lived for a decade) to the west coast, but the album was mainly recorded in his native Norway. Patience features percussionist Dave Heilman, bassist Chris Holm, keyboardist Alexander von Mehren, producers Kato Ådland and Matias Tellez, mixing engineer Jørgen Træen, and classical violinist/composer/arranger Tim Fain. Van Dyke Parks guests on “Put The Camera Down.”

In a previous press release Lerche said the album was inspired by his newfound love of ambient music and running marathons.

“The inspiration behind the theme and feeling of the album comes from the sense of space and time I associate with ambient music and minimalism,” Lerche says. “Ever since Pleasure came out in 2017, I’ve been running a lot, and I listen to mainly abstract music that helps me lose sense of time and structure when I run, what I refer to as ‘patient music. Performing the flamboyant and intense Pleasure show 140 times in one year got me into athleticism, and made me passionate about running. Before this, I never did anything remotely athletic in my life. After Pleasure I felt like slowing down everything in my life. I stopped touring for the first time since I was 18. I moved to LA, and I just focused on writing. I needed to make soothing music.”

Read our recent COVID-19 Quarantine Artist Check In interview with Sondre Lerche.

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