Release – Guided By Voices will release their 18th album in 10 years, called “Universe Room.” The new record packs a mix of energy levels and various realms of sound into 17 diverse tracks over a space of less than 40 minutes.
The new record ventures into surprising territory, where barely any song segments are revisited, typical choruses are a thing of the past, and fidelity daringly shifts between lo-fi and hi-fi, the band said.
Last June, Guided By Voices released their 40th album, “Strut of Kings.” Bandleader Robert Pollard and the longest running GBV lineup of members Doug Gillard, Kevin March, Mark Shue and Bobby Bare Jr, have recorded a 17 albums since 2017.
The single “Fly Religion” is available on streaming services this Friday. “Universe Room” is due for release on Feb. 7, 2025.
The unique audio palette of the new album wasn’t unintentional on the parts of bandleader Pollard and stalwart producer Travis Harrison.
“I wanted to create, hopefully, an experience, kind of a wild ride, where the listener would want to hear it multiple times in order to grasp all the sections and fields of sound to discover something new with each listen,” Pollard said. “I trimmed down the songs so that there wasn’t a lot of repetition, so you get a lot of sections that happen only once or twice.”
The approach to the expansive songwriting adds to the surprising new frontiers of aural sensations from Pollard and members Gillard, March, Shue and Bare Jr. “I wanted to get a little more sonic diversity for this album,” says Pollard, “So I asked each member of the band to record all the instruments for one song and I did three songs myself.”
Check out ‘Fly Religion’ here: