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Jun 20, 2023 By Mark Redfern

M. Ward is releasing a new album, Supernatural Thing, this Friday via ANTI-. Now he has shared its third single, “Too Young to Die,” which features Swedish sister duo First Aid Kit (Klara and Johanna Söderberg) and was shared via a music video. Holly Andres directed the video, which features Ward as a late night security guard who watches footage of First Aid Kit and another version of Ward perform the song on different split screens. Watch it out below, followed by Ward’s upcoming tour dates.

“First Aid Kit are sisters from Stockholm, and when they open their mouths, something amazing happens,” Ward says in a press release. “It was a great thrill to go to Stockholm and record a few songs there. The sound from blood-related harmony singers is impossible to get any other way – The Everly Brothers, The Delmores, The Louvins, The Carters, The Söderbergs - all have the same kind of feeling in their vocals.”

First Aid Kit released a new album, Palomino, in 2022 via Columbia. Read our interview with the band about the album here.

Previously Ward shared Supernatural Thing’s first single, title track “Supernatural Thing,” via an animated music video. Then he shared its second single, “New Kerrang,” which features Scott McMicken of Dr. Dog and was one of our Songs of the Week.

Supernatural Thing also features Jim James, Neko Case, Shovels & Rope, and Kelly Pratt. It includes two covers: “I Can’t Give Everything Away” from David Bowie’s final album Blackstar, and a live rendition of Daniel Johnston’s “Story of an Artist.” Ward previously covered Bowie’s “Let’s Dance” on his acclaimed third album, 2003’s breakthrough release Transfiguration of Vincent.

“Bowie and Johnston are constant sources of inspiration for me, have been for I don’t know how many years,” Ward said in a previous press release.

Summing up Supernatural Thing, Ward said that “the title comes from an early thought as a kid that radio traveled the same airwaves as messages from supernatural things—and music, especially remembered music, is somehow tied up in this exchange. The sending and receiving of messages from memory and dreams seem to move along this same often broken-up wavelength. I see this new record as an extension, 18 years later, of my Transistor Radio record, but this new record is better because its more concise and has more voices and more moods—the way my favorite radio was and still is.”

Supernatural Thing follows two albums Ward released in 2020, Migration Stories and the Billie Holiday covers album Think of Spring. In 2022 he also released Melt Away: A Tribute to Brian Wilson via his duo with Zooey Deschanel, She & Him.

M. Ward European Tour Dates:

6/23 - Los Angeles, CA @ Masonic Lodge at Hollywood Forever Cemetery SOLD OUT
8/15 - Troutdale, OR @ McMenamins Edgefield ^
8/16 - Bend, OR @ Hayden Homes Amphitheater ^
8/18 - Felton, CA @ Felton Music Hall
8/19 - San Luis Obispo, CA @ SLO Brew Rock
8/20 - Ventura, CA @ Ventura Music Hall
8/22 - San Diego, CA @ Cal Coast Credit Union Open Air Theatre ^
8/23 - Mesa, AZ @ Mesa Amphitheatre ^
8/25 - Morrison, CO @ Red Rocks Amphitheatre ^
8/26 - Morrison, CO @ Red Rocks Amphitheatre ^
10/17 - Bristol, UK @ Strange Brew
10/18 - London, UK @ Bush Hall
10/20 - Paris, France @ Point Ephémère

^ - with My Morning Jacket

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