The Avalanches have revealed the mega tracklist for their fourth studio album, No Bad Memories, and with it, a veritable who’s who of feature guests.
Due out October 16th, the 31-track digital edition features collaborations with Jamie xx, Panda Bear, Rivers Cuomo, Karen O, Mike Patton, Barry Can’t Swim, John Glacier, Erick the Architect and Loaded Honey, alongside experimental electronic figures including Ryoji Ikeda, Vegyn and Suzanne Ciani.
There are some particularly unexpected appearances, too.
Actor Haley Joel Osment turns up on two tracks, “El Dorado TV Spot” and “Superfun!™ TV Spot:, the latter also featuring Patton, while Japanese electronic pioneer and Yellow Magic Orchestra founder Haruomi Hosono appears on album closer “The Pavement Light”.
Osment also stars in a new video for the record, created by The Avalanches with Liam Oz.
The sheer number of collaborators makes sense within the sonic world The Avalanches have built around No Bad Memories. Robbie Chater, Tony Di Blasi and Andy Szekeres have taken inspiration from the way advertising and branded technology become tangled with personal memory, turning commercial jingles, startup sounds and forgotten audio logos into raw material.
Alongside the album announcement last month, they said, “It’s been interesting as adults to reflect on this often stunning period of marketing — the creativity, filmmaking, photography, and music, but which was also, you know, selling a completely unobtainable dream.
“The way we value devices and products; the way we reflect and represent ‘a life lived’; the wonder of memory and deep power of nostalgia, especially in sound.
“Revisiting imagery and jingles from childhood and realising how profoundly they have stuck… Taking these sound sources from within the heart of this kinda corporate framework and flipping the fragments into our own kind of joyous pop music… Eventually we arrived at this world of ‘No Bad Memories’.”
It’s a fitting concept for a group that has spent decades finding new emotional life in sounds most others would otherwise leave behind.
That collision between technology, nostalgia and memory extends to the album’s collaborators. Japanese artist Ryoji Ikeda appears across multiple tracks, as does Tunisian producer Khadija Al Hanafi, while acclaimed electronic composer Suzanne Ciani — whose pioneering commercial work included creating sounds for brands like Coca-Cole and Atari —joins Barry Can’t Swim on “Out Love Is Alive”.
Elsewhere, Jamie xx appears on “Every Single Weekend”, “Weezer frontman Rivers Cuomo teams with Vegyn and Baby Marlboro for “All The Time In The World”, Panda Bear contributes to “Highfield” and Carly Simon appears on “One More Fantasy”.
Format completists will have some decisions to make. Four songs — “He Lives In That Old World”, “El Dorado TV Spot”, “Total Recall” and Loaded Honey collaboration “Final Credits” — are exclusive to the digital version, while vinyl, CD and cassette editions instead feature the exclusive Vegyn collab, “Evergreen Altar”.
No Bad Memories follows The Avalanches’ 2020 album We Will Always Love You, and continues a catalogue that began with their landmark debut, Since I Left You.
No Bad Memories is out October 16th and can be pre-saved now.
No Bad Memories Tracklist
- Bd-R
- Together (feat. Nikki Nair, Jessy Lanza & Prentiss)
- Xerox Altalink B8055 (feat. Ryoji Ikeda)
- I Give Everything I Have 2 U (feat. Loaded Honey)
- Every Single Weekend (feat. Jamie xx)
- Friends Forever
- Blue Shadows (feat. Karen O)
- Logoland
- Like Clockwork / Hit By Traffic (feat. Khadija Al Hanafi)
- All The Time In The World (feat. Rivers Cuomo, Vegyn & Baby Marlboro)
- 3D Glasses Not Included
- Vida (feat. Erick the Architect)
- Paradise Island (feat. Khadija Al Hanafi & Mike Patton)
- Unicorn Quest™ (feat. Ryoji Ikeda)
- Far Away (feat. John Glacier & Khadija Al Hanafi)
- He Lives In The Old World ***
- Can’t Get Over Losing You (feat. Portraits of Tracy)
- Watch Out! It’s Cloudy (feat. Khadija Al Hanafi)
- Highfield (feat. Panda Bear)
- El Dorado TV Spot (feat. Haley Joel Osment) ***
- Under Yr Power
- SUV Heaven (feat. Khadija Al Hanafi)
- One More Fantasy (feat. Carly Simon)
- Break Out Corporate Tag (feat. Ryoji Ikeda & Portraits Of Tracy)
- Magic Wand (feat. Barry Can’t Swim)
- Superfun!™ TV Spot (feat. Mike Patton & Haley Joel Osment)
- No Bad Memories
- Our Love Is Alive (feat. Suzanne Ciani & Barry Can’t Swim)
- Total Recall (feat. Mike Patton) ***
- Final Credits (feat. Loaded Honey) (Loaded Honey Version) ***
- The Pavements Light (feat. Haruomi Hosono)
*** Exclusive to Digital album
