Arcade Fire announce sixth album We and release new single

Release will mark the band’s first album since 2017’s ‘Everything Now’

Win Butler of Arcade Fire performing in 2017 (AFP via Getty Images)

Arcade Fire have announced that their sixth studio album We will be released on 6 May.

The US band recorded the project in locations including New Orleans, El Paso, and Mount Desert Island. It is preceded by new single “The Lightning I, II”, which is available now on all major streaming platforms.

We distills “the longest we’ve ever spent writing, uninterrupted, probably ever”, singer Win Butler said in press material about the album. It is comprised from just seven songs divided into two sides, with the first channelling “the fear and loneliness of isolation”, and the second expressing “the joy and power of reconnection”.

The tracklist is as follows:

“‘I’”

“Age of Anxiety I”

“Age of Anxiety II (Rabbit Hole)”

“End of the Empire I-IV”

“‘WE’”

“The Lightning I, II”

“Unconditional I (Lookout Kid)”

“Unconditional II (Race and Religion)”

“WE”

Arcade Fire’s most recent album, Everything Now, was released in 2017. It polarised critics, with some praising the band for experimenting with new sounds, and others feeling they had “succumbed” to the social critiques explored on the album.

We is released on 6 May via Columbia Records.