Future Islands' Fifth album, The Far Field, features the best set of songs yet: both an emotional summation of the themes they've explored over the past decade and a further distillation of their signature art-pop sound. It's the first Future Islands record featuring live drums by Michael Lowry, who joined the band prior to their viral performance of "Seasons" on Letterman, and whose energy propels the band's sound to new heights. With Congleton's production and string and horn arrangements by Patrick McMinn, The Far Field finds Future Islands crafting soundscapes larger and more opulent than ever before, as sonically lush and expansive as they are lyrically raw and direct. "Shadows," a stunner of a duet between Herring and Blondie's Debbie Harry, offers a naked look at heartache, finding hope and power in facing pain and personal flaws head-on.

"Samuel T Herring, Future Islands’ crooner and gymnastic centrepiece, has just picked himself up off the floor. “It took 1,070 shows to fall the f*** off the stage,” he says. “Don’t worry, I’m okay.” It’s an occupational hazard for Herring, who fronts the band with boundless energy and a menagerie of dance moves." - The Independent

"It takes all of five songs for Samuel T Herring’s checked shirt to transition from ironed fabric to sodden dishrag. Future Islands’ frontman looks as though he has just crawled on to a beach after a boating accident – wild-eyed, gesticulating, drenched. To list Herring’s many antics over the course of the set feels like a cheap shot, reducing to mere spectacle a complex and footnoted ritual of menace, suffering, libido and joy. But it all goes irrevocably soggy on A Dream of You And Me – a song from 2014’s Singles album – when he starts Cossack dancing, and then licking his own arms. After some fine robot moves in the encore, Herring jokes that he hasn’t attempted them on stage since about 2004."
- The Guardian

December 14

San Fran

Wellington

with Orchestra of Spheres

tickets: undertheradar.co.nz

The Powerstation

Auckland

with Silicon

tickets: aaaticketing.co.nz