• News

• All

Jul 20, 2020 By Samantha Small Photography by Kendall Atwater Wye Oak

Wye Oak (Jenn Wasner and Andy Stack) are asking the tough questions. Today, the indie project released track “No Place” an eerie song about the (extra) distance placed between strangers right now. The new song is off their new EP, No Horizon, set to come out July 31 via Merge.

The entire EP features the Brooklyn Youth Chorus, but in this particular track they carry the melody, which is semi-ironic, as the song emphasizes isolation. “Who are you? Who Am I? What’s happened to us?” they ask over electronic drums and crushing synth as they observe we can’t kiss each other, shake hands, because we’re afraid of being sick.

In a press release, Jenn Wasner explains the meaning behind the song:

“This song is about the separation between our consciousness and our physical bodies, and how it feels to forget that you even have a body in the first place. Of course, it gets easier and easier to use your body less and less; as we innovate more efficient ways of achieving our temporal goals, we are making them somewhat obsolete. Personally, I’m very pro-body, even as I spent the first half of my life hating and fighting against mine and all of its perceived imperfections. But it’s hard to look around and not at least imagine that we might be some of the last humans on earth to ever enjoy what having a body actually feels like, on a planet that isn’t yet completely inhospitable to us. And that seems like something worth noticing.”

Recently, the band has released quite a few singles. The EP’s lead track “AEIO,” was our #1 Song of the Week. Meanwhile the standalone single “Walk Soft” also made our Songs of the Week list and another standalone single “Fortune” was our #1 on that week’s Songs of the Week list. Back in January, they also shared “Fear of Heights,” another #1 on that week’s Songs of the Week list. None of these songs, besides “AEIO,” feature on No Horizon. They also recently shared, JOIN, a new mini documentary highlighting the history of the band.

Wye Oak released their last album, The Louder I Call, the Faster It Runs, back in April 2018 via Merge. (It was our Album of the Week and one of our Top 100 Albums of 2018.) In February 2019 they shared a brand new song, “Evergreen,” via the Adult Swim Singles series (it was one of our Songs of the Week).

Since their last album, Stack launched his solo project, Joyero, releasing his debut album as Joyero, Release the Dogs, in August 2019 via Merge. Wasner, meanwhile, has been touring as part of Bon Iver’s band.

In June Wasner surprise-released Like So Much Desire, a new EP with her Flock of Dimes solo project. It was her first release for Sub Pop and the title track made our Songs of the Week list.

Read our 2018 interview with Wye Oak on The Louder I Call, the Faster It Runs.

Pick up our last print issue (the My Favorite Album Issue) to read Andy Stack’s essay about his all-time favorite album.

Support Under the Radar on Patreon.