PJ Harvey announces first album in seven years

Mercury Prize winning musician PJ Harvey has announced her forthcoming sixth studio album today.

I Inside the Old Year Dying will mark Harvey’s first since 2016’s Grammy-nominated The Hope Six Demolition Project, and is set to arrive on July 7th via Partisan Records.

To mark the announcement, PJ Harvey has released a new song, 'A Child’s Question, August', with the announcement of her tenth studio album. I Inside the Old Year Dying is produced by long-time collaborators Flood and John Parish.

Today’s song release comes with a video from the two-time Mercury Prize winner, directed by Steve Gullick.

The new songs, Harvey says, offer “a resting space, a solace, a comfort, a balm - which feels timely for the times we’re in.”

Mentored by Scottish poet Don Paterson, Harvey was working on Orlam, the accomplished work of poetry – her second, after 2015’s The Hollow of the Hand - that was published last year and became one of the new album’s key inspirations. There were also the reissues of Harvey’s preceding albums – and, in new editions, their demo versions – that came out between 2020 and 2022.

There were numerous catalysts for the English artist’s official return. Filmmaker Steve McQueen met Harvey in Chicago during the Hope Six period. His advice was to remember what she loves about words, images and music and to put away the concept of writing “an album” to focus on and play with these three passions.

Picking up the guitar or sitting down at the piano to play her favourite songs by such artists as Nina Simone or Bob Dylan - reconfirmed her passion for the artform.

The new songs, Harvey says, “all came out of me in about three weeks”. At Battery Studios, in North West London, she continued a three-way creative bond that now goes back nearly 30 years; Harvey, her enduring collaborator and creative partner John Parish, and legendary producer Flood.

“The studio was set up for live play, and that's all we did,” she says. 'A Child’s Question, August' is one result, marking an uplifting, impactful track.

“I think the album is about searching, looking - the intensity of first love, and seeking meaning,” says Harvey. “Not that there has to be a message, but the feeling I get from the record is one of love – it’s tinged with sadness and loss, but it’s loving. I think that's what makes it feel so welcoming: so open.”

Shooting to fame with her seminal albums Stories From The City, Stories From The Sea (2001) and Let England Shake (2011), the accomplished poet and visual artist, musician and songwriter is striking in her originality.

In recent years, The Hope Six Demolition Project (2016) went to No.1 album in her native UK, while she worked on compositions for stage and screen - including Sharon Horgan’s acclaimed Bad Sisters mini-series.

Pre-order the album here.

I Inside the Old Year Dying tracklisting:

1. Prayer at the Gate
2. Autumn Term
3. Lwonesome Tonight
4. Seem an I
5. The Nether-edge
6. I Inside the Old Year Dying
7. All Souls
8. A Child’s Question, August
9. I Inside the Old I Dying
10. August
11. A Child’s Question, July
12. A Noiseless Noise