WATCH THE VIDEO FOR NEW SINGLE “THE DEEPEST SIGHS, THE FRANKEST SHADOWS”
Today, Gang of Youths are excited to announce the upcoming release of their highly-anticipated second album Go Father In Lightness on August 18th via RED MUSIC. Pre-order for the album is now available HERE across all digital service providers.
Since the release of their 2015 debut The Positions, Gang of Youths has taken Australia by storm, landing in the top 5 on the Australian album charts, receiving multiple ARIA Award nominations and gracing this month’s cover of Rolling Stone. The Positions received acclaim internationally from The Guardian, Stereogum, NME, and more as the band supported the likes of Vampire Weekend, Sky Ferreira, and Manchester Orchestra on the road.
The band has also given us one final taste of what’s to come with their latest single and compelling cinematic video, “The Deepest Sighs, The Frankest Shadows.”
“This song came about after I struggled with writer’s block for a year, barely managing to etch out more than a single verse of something awful the whole time. I was walking home across the Brooklyn Bridge one night, questioning my place in the world, contemplating giving up music and doing something more substantial. I sort of felt that I wasn’t doing anything that actually mattered. But I looked out at the skyline, all silvery and strange and in typical self-indulged frontman fashion, I began to revel in this moment of abandon, of self-hate. As a result, I think I stumbled across a kind life-affirming axiom; that in a cosmos potentially absent of meaning, and an existence devoid of objective value, I have an opportunity to invent my own meaning. We all do. We can ascribe meaning and value to our own lives and in a way, attribute great esteem and value to each other as a result.
All of us as adults, from youth to old age are drunk, stumbling around in the dark looking for a kebab. I’m scared and unsure, and I want to acknowledge this rather than repress it, or allow cynics to denigrate me because of it. So the song is about becoming more human, more aware and I guess in a way, more alive.” – Dave Le’aupepe
The video, using only one drone and in just a single take, was directed by Dan & Jared Daperis from LateNite Films, on location in Little River, Victoria. This cinematic experience has captured the true meaning behind the song, where lead singer Le’aupepe tries to outrun the feeling of loneliness, pleading for any reason to go on.
Gang of Youths will play a run of Australian dates this Fall, with a North American tour to be announced soon.
Go Farther In Lightness Tracklist:
- Fear and Trembling
- What Can I Do If The Fire Goes Out?
- Atlas Drowned
- Keep Me In The Open
- i) L’imaginaire
- Do Not Let Your Spirit Wane
- ii) Go Farther In Lightness
- Achilles Come Down
- Perservere
iii) Le Symbolique
- Let Me Down Easy
- The Heart Is A Muscle
- iv) Le Réel
- The Deepest Sighs, The Frankest Shadows
- Our Time Is Short
- Say Yes To Life
Upcoming AUS Tour Dates:
8/31/17 – Tivoli – Brisbane, QLD
9/1/17 – Tivoli – Brisbane, QLD
9/6/17 – Festival Hall – Melbourne, VIC
9/8/17 – Hordern Pavillion – Sydney, NSW
9/13/17 – Odean Theatre – Hobart, TAS
9/15/17 – Thebarton Theatre – Adelaide, SA
9/16/17 – Metropolis – Fremantle, WA
Upcoming UK/EU Tour Dates:
10/9/17 – La Boule Noire – Paris, France
10/10/17 – Sugar Factory – Amsterdam, Netherlands
10/11/17 – Musik & Frieden – Berlin, Germany
10/12/17 – Ampere – Munich, Germany
10/13/17 – Artheater – Cologne, Germany
10/15/17 – Exchange – Bristol, UK
10/16/17 – Headrow House – Leeds, UK
10/17/17 – Stereo – Glasgow, UK
10/18/17 – Gullivers – Manchester, UK
10/19/17 – Electric Ballroom – London, UK
Biography:
The holiness of love, the chaos and rapture of surviving against all odds, these are what drive Gang of Youths. A five piece from Sydney founded in the confines of their religious youth, enchanted by the spectacle of worship and deliverance, it’s no wonder their music burns with the desperation of apocalypse. With singer Dave Le’aupepe’s lyrics drawn from some of the most miserable life experiences available to humanity, and the band’s music taking cues from rock history’s most ambitious and theatrical preachers, Gang of Youths drag the beauty out of everything from hell to high heaven.
Debuting in 2013 with smoldering single “Evangelists,” they were met with instant radio play and praise. Only just out of high school, Le’aupepe was already planning to marry his girlfriend, settle down, and leave his dreams of music behind, but the band’s first brush with recognition suggested there could be more to life than the path that had seemed so obviously laid before him. Things moved quickly: the band started their own record label, Mosy Recordings, got snatched up for really great support slots with Vampire Weekend, Foster The People, Manchester Orchestra, Frightened Rabbit. But as soon as the band let themselves get their hopes up, Le’aupepe would begin the worst period of his life.
Le’aupepe’s soon-to-be wife was diagnosed with lung cancer after a melanoma on her ear metastasized. He began writing the songs that would eventually become their debut record so she had something to listen to in hospital. After they married, the band went into a studio in New York to track the new record. Working with producer Kevin McMahon (Swans, Rhett Miller, Titus Andronicus) and with Peter Katis (The National, Local Natives, Frightened Rabbit) mixing, they’d assembled a dream team – just one of the peaks that would contrast against the tragedy unfolding in Le’aupepe’s life.
Le’aupepe’s wife survived, but the relationship had other problems. Struggling to balance his commitments to the band – his closest friends – against his commitments to his marriage, unable to enjoy success with one while the other was breaking down, and feeling unworthy of happiness, Le’aupepe was dragged into self-destruction. “I was secretive, unkind, abusing drink and drugs,” Le’aupepe says. The breakdown of his marriage and later attempted suicide were where Dave finally bottomed out, but the rest of the band were there to help him climb back up. “I don’t ever wanna be unkind again,” Le’aupepe says. “I’ll spend the rest of my life repaying them for sticking with me.”
Out of all that trauma and regret, Gang of Youths drew The Positions. Praised worldwide for its sincerity and nuance, blending the melodrama of rock’s greatest traditions with piercing, hyper-literate lyrics, The Positions demolished any lingering notions of a pop/alternative dichotomy. Dave was also finding a new lease on life, finding strength in the band and the women in his family, including his young niece whose middle name, Magnolia, was taken from the title of The Positions‘ most triumphant song.
Debuting at #5 on the ARIA Charts and embraced by Australian youth tastemaker triple j, The Positions became the soundtrack for the Australian winter in 2015, with the band embarking on a national tour to support the record. It was the first time much of the country was seeing Gang of Youths up close, and they were charmed in every state. Reports praised their thumping live sets for living up to their songs’ stadium-sized ambitions, stating that the band were a guaranteed success.
A year later the band released Let Me Be Clear EP, following on the success of their 2014 five-ARIA-Award-nominated debut album The Positions. Addressing similar themes of loss and heartbreak trumped by togetherness, the EP also showed the band expanding their scope with sweeping string arrangements and renewed dedication to songs as epic declarations of feeling. The band hoped to achieve admirable and genuine things with this new release, as said by Leau’pepe, “I want to make the most hopeful, life-affirming music possible. We want listeners to feel affirmed, to feel hopeful, and feel more. That’s the most important thing we want to accomplish.”
Once again scoring glowing praise across the board, Let Me Be Clear cemented Gang of Youths as mainstays of the Australian music landscape. After the success of their UK, European and USA tour, Gang Of Youths came back to Australian shores and rocked crowds and critics alike with stellar performances at Byron Bay’s Splendour In The Grass and St. Jerome’s Laneway, featuring songs from Let Me Be Clear, and also teasing fans with a taste of their highly-anticipated sophomore album Go Farther In Lightness.
