James Vincent McMorrow announces new album Wide Open, Horses and shares new single

Irish singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and producer, James Vincent McMorrow, returns with the announcement of his seventh full-length album Wide Open, Horses.

The album is due out June 14 2024 while the lead single 'Never Gone' is out today.

To mark the news, McMorrow shared a live video of the track. The live video was shot in the Wicklow mountains just outside of Dublin and is a simple affair and features the singer-songwriter as a solitary figure.

A breathtaking landscape, McMorrow's performance of his ethereal guitar track features the musician in among the gorses of the Wicklow mountain, making for a folkloric scene.

In 2023, the musician brought Wide Open, Horses to life—on stage. Booking two nights at The National Concert Hall in Dublin, McMorrow recorded a handful of lo-fi demos, practiced the material for a week, and then hit the stage.

Phones weren’t allowed, but the artist recorded the intimate live session to “see what worked and what didn’t work.”

Speaking about the National Concert Hall Event, McMorrow said: "I literally performed the album before it was recorded,”

“The whole point was to expose the flaws and also highlight the special little moments. It was an odd experiment, but it worked great. The notion is so simple, ‘Write songs and perform them live’.

He says of the experience that: "Without cameras, they were the best shows I’ve ever played—which is interesting because no one knew the music! Everyone was just experiencing it though.

"It was a heartening experience for everyone involved."

This focus group approach deeply informed McMorrow's writing process, who said of the album's message that it's: "about finding relief from the cycle of life’s pressure,”

"I don’t think the theory ‘modernity equals better’ holds much water these days. The more technology we add, the more unhappy everyone seems to be. I don’t want to move backwards, but I felt a sense of nostalgia and happiness in the album.

"It would be grandiose of me to think I could offer you some profound release through words and lyrics, but maybe I can…The job is to make a record I love and hopefully offer a respite. Maybe we can all get back to a life where we aren’t so obsessed with trying to seek out meaning from absolutely everything".

Wide Open Horses is billed for a June 14 release. Fans can preserve the album here.

Tracklisting for Wide Open Horses: 

1. Never gone
2. Look up!!!
3. No One Get's What They Wanted
4. Stay Cool
5. Wide Open, Horses
6. The Day All The Lights Went Out
7. Give Up
8. The Standard
9. Things We Tell Ourselves
10. White Out
11. Darkest Days Of Winter
12. Call Me Back
13. Meet Me In The Garden