“’skin in the game’ subtly surges forward, gliding with the delicate grace and breathtaking shimmer Slowdive fans have come to know and love.” — Stereogum
“It’s very dynamic, it’s very pretty, it’s got a lot of beautiful twinkly layers throughout a lot of the instrumental. It’s kind of everything that I was hoping for when the band came back out of their hiatus period.” — The Needle Drop
“’skin in the game’ is a cinematic, universe-spanning lamentation; a swirling, cathartic exorcism of impossible feeling.” — Paste
Today, slowdive present their new track/video, ‘the slab,‘ from their highly anticipated fifth album, everything is alive, out September 1st on Dead Oceans. Album closer ‘the slab’ crashes into existence with skittering percussion, fuzzed out guitars, and ominous synths. Following along slowdive’s electric trail of tracks — the “suave” (NPR Music) “kisses,” and “skin in the game,” “a clarifying shoegaze reset from the masters themselves” (NYLON) — “the slab” continues previewing the sonic breadth of everything is alive to thrilling effect. On “the slab,” vocalist/guitarist Neil Halstead says, “This is the
heaviest track on the record and as the name suggests we wanted it to feel like a big slab of music. We wanted it to feel very dense.”
Spanning psychedelic soundscapes, pulsating 80’s electronic elements and John Cale inspired journeys, everything is alive contains the duality of Slowdive’s familiar internal language mixed with the exaltation of new beginnings. Dedicated to Goswell’s mother and Scott’s father, who both died in 2020, it’s an exploration into the shimmering nature of life and the universal touch points within it. “There were some profound shifts for some of us personally,” Goswell says. Those crossroads are reflected in the many-layered emotional tenor of Slowdive’s music; everything is alive is heavy with experience, but each note is poised, wise, and necessarily pitched to hope. Its unique alchemy subtly embodies both sadness and gratitude, groundedness and uplift.
Watch the “skin in the game” Visualizer
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