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Nov 09, 2021 By Joey Arnone Photography by Mads Perch

Placebo have announced the release of their eighth studio album, Never Let Me Go, which will be out on March 25, 2022 via Rise. They have also shared a new song from it, “Surrounded By Spies.” Listen to the song and view the album’s tracklist/cover art below.

Vocalist Brian Molko elaborates on the song in a press release: “I began writing the lyrics when I discovered my neighbors were spying on me on behalf of parties with a nefarious agenda. I then began to ponder the countless ways in which our privacy has been eroded and stolen since the introduction of worldwide CCTV cameras that now employ racist facial recognition technologies; the rise of the internet and the cellphone, which has turned practically every user into a paparazzo and spectators in their own lives, and how we have mostly all offered up personal information to enormous multinationals whose sole intent is to exploit us.

“I used the cut-up technique invented by William S. Burroughs and popularized in modern song by David Bowie. It’s a true story told through a lens of paranoia, complete disgust for modern society’s values and the deification of surveillance capitalism. The narrator is at the end of their tether, hopeless and afraid, completely at odds with our newfound progress and the god of money.”

The duo previously shared the album track “Beautiful James” in September. Their previous album, Loud Like Love, came out in 2013 via Vertigo.

Never Let Me Go Tracklist:

1. Forever Chemicals
2. Beautiful James
3. Hugz
4. Happy Birthday In The Sky
5. The Prodigal
6. Surrounded By Spies
7. Try Better Next Time
8. Sad White Reggae
9. Twin Demons
10. Chemtrails
11. This Is What You Wanted
12. Went Missing
13. Fix Yourself

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