The Kills announce new album ‘Ash & Ice’

The Kills announce new album 'Ash & Ice' and share video for "Doing it to Death"
Photo Credit - Kenneth Cappello

The Kill have unveiled details on their highly anticipated fifth album. Titled Ash & Ice, the album will be released on June 3rd via Domino Records. Accompanying today’s announce is the video for brand new single “Doing It To Death”, directed by Wendy Morgan (Janelle Monae, Laura Mvula) and shot in Los Angeles last month. Check it out below.

Over their almost decade-and-a-half career, The Kills have released four records. Each one a restless, reckless enigmatic art statement that bristled with tension, anxiety, sex, unstudied cool and winking ennui, yet not one of them sounded like the previous one. Ash & Ice is the follow up to 2011’s Blood Pressures and was five years in the making in part due to Jamie Hince’s five hand surgeries, which resulted in him having to re-learn how to play guitar with a permanently damaged finger.

Unlike earlier albums, which have largely been written and recorded at Key Club Studio in Benton Harbor, Michigan, the bulk of the recording for Ash & Ice took place in a rented house in LA and at the world famous Electric Lady Studios in NYC. The album was produced by Jamie Hince and co-produced by John O’Mahony (Metric, The Cribs), and mixed by Tom Elmhirst (Adele, Arcade Fire, Amy Winehouse) and Tchad Blake (Black Keys, Arctic Monkeys).

It was during Hince’s recuperation from surgery that he first started sketching out what would become the songs for the album. To shake up the writing process, Hince booked a solo trip on the infamous Trans-Siberian Express for inspiration while Alison Mosshart, now residing in Nashville, TN, wrote some of the most affecting, poetically candid lyrics that she ever has, painting word pictures that mine the dangerous terrain between romantic obsession, prophecy and tough love. Where previous albums had an air of detachment and emotional austerity, underpinned by an uneasy self-awareness and unexpressed anger, the 13 songs on Ash & Ice are more understated, less tempestuous and more affecting because of that, exposing the kind of push-pull you feel when you find yourself in a complicated but all-consuming relationship.

Ash & Ice Tracklist

1. Doing It To Death
2. Heart Of A Dog
3. Hard Habit To Break
4. Bitter Fruit
5. Days Of Why And How
6. Let It Drop
7. Hum For Your Buzz
8. Siberian Nights
9. That Love
10. Impossible Tracks
11. Black Tar
12. Echo Home
13. Whirling Eye

The Kills Tour Dates

March 16 Mexico City, MX – House of Vans 50th Anniversary
March 17 Austin, TX – Culture Collide/StubHub Showcase (SXSW)
March 18 Austin, TX – Spotify House (SXSW)
April 7 Nashville, TN – Exit/In (Sold Out)
April 8 Louisville, KY – Headliner’s Music Hall
April 9 Columbus, OH – CD 102.5 Day (Sold Out)
April 11 Philadelphia, PA – Union Transfer
April 12 Brooklyn, NY – Warsaw (Sold Out)
April 13 Brooklyn, NY – Warsaw (Sold Out)
April 15 Indio, CA – Coachella (Sold Out)
April 18 Los Angeles, CA – Mayan Theatre
April 19 Santa Ana, CA – The Observatory
April 22 Indio, CA – Coachella (Sold Out)
May 1 Amsterdam, NL – Melkweg
May 3 Paris, FR – La Cigale
May 4 London, UK – Village Underground
May 13 Atlanta, GA – Shaky Knees Festival
May 14 Washington, DC – 9:30 Club
May 19 Boston, MA – Paradise Rock Club
May 21 Toronto, ON – Danforth Music Hall
May 22 Detroit, MI – St Andrew’s Hall
May 23 Chicago, IL – Riviera Theatre
May 25 Minneapolis, MN – First Avenue
May 26 Kansas City, KS – Midland Theatre
May 27 Denver, CO – Ogden Theatre
May 28 Salt Lake City, UT – The Depot
May 31 Vancouver, BC – Commodore Ballroom
June 1 Seattle, WA – Showbox SoDo
June 2 Portland, OR – Roseland Theater
June 4 San Francisco, CA – Fox Theater
June 9 – 12 Newport, UK – Isle of Wight Festival
July 6 Kiev, Ukraine – U-Park Festival
July 9 Moscow, Russia – Park Live Festival
August 6 Katowice, Poland – Off Festival

Advertisement

Looking for something new to listen to?

Sign up to our all-new newsletter for top-notch reviews, news, videos and playlists.