Alan Sparhawk dropped a new single and video on Tuesday, the abrasive and unsettling Can U Hear.
It's two hundred and nine seconds of skittering beats, relentless synthetic bass and pitch-shifting vocals that sound like the bastard child of Believe by Cher. All inspired by kit that Alan's kids used to play around with in the studio with their friends.
There will be a lot of discourse and commentary about Alan's motivation and inspiration for this - and forthcoming album White Roses, My God. The loss of Alan's wife Mimi Parker in 2022 was inevitably a crushing, life-changing moment and brought about an unwanted, seismic change, not least closing the door on Low, the band they had co-founded (with John Nichols) three decades previously.
But that would completely ignore Alan's questing spirit, hunger for new sonic experiences and, to slightly paraphrase one of his own comments in the promo, "tapping into a part of me that I’ve come to trust, so I [keep] recording."
Can U Hear sounds like nothing Alan has recorded before, yet simultaneously an "of course" moment that sounds exactly like what his next venture should be.
White Roses, My God is out on 27th September, with a tour to transform the music further in a live setting.
Alan is in the UK for two consecutive concerts in Leeds and Cardiff, the latter on Tuesday 5th November. The following day will mark three years since Mimi's passing. I hope the love and empathy of the audience will provide a healing balm for Alan's unimaginable loss.
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