Bartees Strange Releases New Album Horror!

Bartees Strange has shared new single ‘Backseat Banton’ from his new album Horror, out now. The final track on the album, ‘Backseat Banton’ serves as a closing statement for Horror’s shadow essay – Banton meaning storyteller in Caribbean mythology. In life, Bartees cannot decide whether to be along for the ride or struggle to grasp the steering wheel. “Being scared has made me bigger now, bigger than I was. The darkest side of waking up is seeing who I’ve become. Grace is still a saviour, every moment that it comes. I’m reminded of a hopeful me and how fast that I could run.” Strange sings over a particularly tender moment in the song’s bopping alt-pop groove. ‘Backseat Banton’ follows Horror singles ‘Wants Needs’, an uproarious confessional anthem, ‘Too Much’, a sonic and lyrical love letter to himself, ‘Sober’, an introspective ballad about falling short in a relationship, and the explosive lead single ‘Lie 95’.

Strange was raised on fear. His family told him scary stories to teach life lessons, and at an early age, he started watching scary movies to practice being strong. The world can be a terrifying place, and for a young, queer, Black person in rural America, that terror can be visceral. Horror is an album about facing those fears and growing to become someone to be feared.

Horror began at Strange’s home studio with an eye toward production. A session with Yves and Lawrence Rothman (Yves Tumor, Lady Gaga) provided a rhythmic and sonic backbone for chunks of the record. After Strange met Jack Antonoff and the pair became fast friends, Antonoff began work on Horror. The twosome finished the record together, working the songs raw, editing, arranging, and dressing them up in clothing bound to inspire fear. Throughout the record, Strange lays down one difficult truth after another, all over a sonic pastiche of music that soundtracked his childhood. Across the album’s 12 new tracks are genre-bending threads of the music his dad introduced him to - Parliament Funkadelic, Fleetwood Mac and Teddy Pendergrass - merged with Strange’s interest in hip-hop, country, indie rock, and house.

‘Wants Needs’ follows Horror singles ‘Too Much’, a sonic and lyrical love letter to himself, ‘Sober’, an introspective ballad about falling short in a relationship, and the explosive lead single ‘Lie 95’.
Since releasing his 2022 breakout album Farm to Table, Strange has toured alongside boygenius, Clairo, Dijon and The National.

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