[Photo credit: Guy Lowndes]

Cry those tears of joy, because Father John Misty’s first round of 2017 North American tour dates in support of Pure Comedy (out April 7th) are on the books. Headlining dates include Toronto’s Royal Alexandra Theatre (May 5th and 6th), Brooklyn’s King Theatre (May 10th), Chicago Theatre (May 15th), The Paramount in Seattle (May 24th), Vancouver’s Festival Lawn at Deer Lake Park (May 26th), and Mexico City’s Metropolitan Theatre (June 7th).

… and LIVE FROM NEW YORK, IT’S FATHER JOHN MISTY!!!! About to be the musical guest (with host Octavia Spencer) on Saturday Night Live this coming March 4th at 11:30pm /10:30pmCT on NBC.

Father John Misty’s “Ballad of the Dying Man” is a standout track from Pure Comedy. The track has earned raves from Pitchfork (“Best New Track”), Rolling Stone, Stereogum, The Ringer, SPIN, and more. The Ringer says of the track, “It is simultaneously plaintive and winking and obnoxious and beautiful, as all the good Father John Misty songs are.”  SPIN offers this, “ It opens with a descending chord progression on acoustic guitar and piano that recalls Neil Young’s “Motion Pictures,” then slides into a patient pop arrangement worthy of Elton John.”

Father John Misty’s “Ballad of the Dying Man” is the gorgeous new single and standout from Pure Comedy, his forthcoming third album.

As it also happens, Beats 1’s Zane Lowe just named “Ballad of the Dying Man” his “World Record” on today’s show. Tune in later this morning (10amPST) to hear the track, as well as the first installment of Tillman’s two-part interview with Lowe, where they discuss the making of the album [link here].
 
“Ballad of the Dying Man” follows the release of “Pure Comedy,” the prescient title track released late last month, a surreal, 30-minute film about the making of the album, and the thought provoking “Two Wildly Different Perspectives”, earlier this week.  

Pure Comedy’s front/back covers and gatefold feature a gargantuan original piece (his first ever commission of its kind) by Ed Steed (The New Yorker) and cover variations for the standard LP and CD will be randomly distributed.  Collect them all!  Please! 

Pure Comedy is now available for preorder through Father John Misty’s Official Store, Sub Pop Mega Mart, and Bella Union in the following formats:

• A Deluxe 2xLP version on aluminum & copper vinyl, a die-cut customizable jacket with 4 interactive “background” sleeves (so you can have whatever sky you damn well feel like as the cover), all encased in a clear slipcase. Includes a fold-out poster and an exclusive holographic tarot card by Ed Steed.
• A 2xLP gatefold version also available in 4 cover variations on black vinyl
• A CD gatefold digipak with slipcase available in 4 cover variations
• Digital
• Cassette

TAKE NOTE: LP orders through Father John Misty’s Official Store, megamart.subpop.com, Bella Union and select independent retailers will receive a limited 7” single featuring the first physical release of fan favorite “Real Love Baby” on the A-side and the as yet unreleased track, “Rejected Generic Pop Song, March ‘15 #3” on the B-side (while supplies last). A new t-shirt design will be available from Sub Pop (white or black) and Bella Union, in addition to a new line of merch from Father John Misty’s online store.

[Photo Credit: Guy Lowndes]

Read some (well, a veritable fuck ton) words from Josh over here, then follow him just about everywhere in the universe via Facebook.

Collective hearts here at Sub Pop HQ swell with pride today, as we’re thrilled to announce Father John Misty’s Pure Comedy - the highly anticipated follow-up to his internationally acclaimed album, I Love You, Honeybear - will hit store shelves the world over on Friday, April 7th.

Pure Comedy’s front/back covers and gatefold feature a gargantuan original piece (his first ever commission of its kind) by Ed Steed (The New Yorker) and cover variations for the standard LP and CD will be randomly distributed.  Collect them all!  Please! 

Pure Comedy is now available for preorder through Father John Misty’s Official Store, Sub Pop Mega Mart, and Bella Union in the following formats:

• A Deluxe 2xLP version on aluminum & copper vinyl, a die-cut customizable jacket with 4 interactive “background” sleeves (so you can have whatever sky you damn well feel like as the cover), all encased in a clear slipcase. Includes a fold-out poster and an exclusive holographic tarot card by Ed Steed.
• A 2xLP gatefold version also available in 4 cover variations on black vinyl
• A CD gatefold digipak with slipcase available in 4 cover variations
• Digital
• Cassette

TAKE NOTE: LP orders through Father John Misty’s Official Store, megamart.subpop.com, Bella Union and select independent retailers will receive a limited 7” single featuring the first physical release of fan favorite “Real Love Baby” on the A-side and the as yet unreleased track, “Rejected Generic Pop Song, March ‘15 #3” on the B-side (while supplies last). A new t-shirt design will be available from Sub Pop and Bella Union, in addition to a new line of merch from Father John Misty’s online store.

Pure Comedy
Tracklisting:
1. Pure Comedy
2. Total Entertainment Forever
3. Things it Would Have Been Helpful to Know Before the Revolution
4. Ballad of the Dying Man
5. Birdie
6. Leaving LA
7. A Bigger Paper Bag
8. When the God of Love Returns There’ll Be Hell to Pay
9. Smoochie
10. Two Wildly Different Perspectives
11. The Memo
12. So I’m Growing Old on Magic Mountain
13. In Twenty Years or So

BUT WAIT, THERE’S MORE: Tillman and Grant James (“Funtimes in Babylon,” “I Love You, Honeybear”) also co-directed Pure Comedy: The Film. Pure Comedy is a gorgeously rendered black & white document of the live tracking, as well as a surreal look into Tillman’s writing process.  A six-person crew, complete with cranes in the tracking rooms, captured every moment of the recording, giving the viewer intimate audience to actual album takes, including the one and only 2:00am performance of the 13-minute “Leaving LA.”  It also features the only known recording of Tillman’s love ballad to his sound engineer Trevor Spencer.  The 30-minute film is available for viewing now at Father John Misty’s new website.
 
Father John Misty’s first live appearance in support of Pure Comedy will be on the Coachella mainstage, Fridays April 14th, and 21st.

[Photo Credit: Guy Lowndes]

Read some (well, a veritable fuck ton) words from Josh over here, then follow him just about everywhere in the universe via Facebook.

Listen to the Season 2 trailer, and subscribe now!

Mere months after its unforeseeably really, pretty great first season earlier this year, and in response to largely precedented levels of demand for more, the Sub Pop Podcast will return for a 10-episode second season on Wednesday, October 12th. Season Two of the Sub Pop Podcast will run weekly from October 12th through December 14th and will be available through all finer podcast distribution points.

iTunes subscribe link: http://u.subpop.com/1Svyqr3

Other subscribe link: http://u.subpop.com/2dOUctz

Produced and hosted by real-life Sub Pop employees Alissa Atkins and Arwen Nicks at the label’s Seattle headquarters, the Sub Pop Podcast, of course, is where you can hear stories from inside, outside, and adjacent to Sub Pop, Seattle’s premier medium-sized record label. We focus on conversations with our artists, people who work at/with/around Sub Pop, and anyone else willing or reckless enough to talk to us. And same goes for our sibling label Hardly Art. We will continue to include, impose on, sponge off, and otherwise implicate them, as well.
 
In its conspicuously excellent debut season, from January 10th of this year, through to April 1st, we managed to produce and then release 11 (which, for some reason, we called 10 ½…) episodes of Sub Pop’s very first podcast. And then, between April 1 and now, we put out an additional two, interstitial, summer episodes in an effort to sustain the arguably ravenous interest of our dozens upon dozens of regular listeners. We spoke with principal members of Band of Horses, Mass Gothic, Chastity Belt, Mudhoney, Shearwater, S, King Tuff, and a whole bunch more. And, we were recognized with an Honorable Mention in the Seattle Weekly’s 2016 Readers’ Poll for local, music-based podcasts which currently exist! This sort of intoxicating recognition has us gunning for at least second runner-up next year. The entirety of this first season, and our summer episodes remain available everywhere now.
 
In the upcoming second season, unrelated to any outstanding debts or lost bets, we managed to convince an impressive array of folks to talk with us. Here we are referring to such celebrated figures from the wide world of entertainment as: Alex and Victoria from Beach House, Sam Beam from Iron and Wine, Tad from TAD, Benjamin Gibbard from both Death Cab for Cutie and The Postal Service, Kathleen Hanna, Father John Misty, Jonah Ray, members of CSS and Clipping, our boss and benefactor Jonathan Poneman (More than once! He’s the boss!), plus, reliably, “more.” We also took the Sub Pop Podcast on the road, with trips to both Poland and Portland, and down to the Sub Pop store at Sea-Tac Airport.
 
In the spirit of tell and show, you can listen to a trailer for the Sub Pop Podcast, Season Two (and, again, every previous episode) at subpop.fm RIGHT NOW. If you like what you hear, you can subscribe (in iTunes or anything) right now, too. The first episode of the new season will be available Wednesday, October 12, and new episodes will be delivered weekly until December 14, 2016.
 
SO! Visit subpop.fm to listen to the new trailer for the second season, subscribe to the podcast, and sign up for the podcast mailing list.  Send us your thoughts and feelings here: podcast@subpop.com.

The Sub Pop Podcast: Absolutely nothing sounds better.

Nothing Compares 2 U, Grammy.

Sure, we have loved and lost before. Who among us hasn’t? And when it comes to that rare, fine sort of love reserved for major music industry awards like the Grammys, we have loved really, really hard. With the exception of that one time in 2008, when The Flight of the Conchords somewhat miraculously won for Best Comedy Album, we have also, regularly, lost. In fact, we have lost TWICE over the years just to “Weird Al” Yankovic alone. One would imagine that we would, at some point, learn from these experiences.

[To be clear here, when I use “we” throughout the preceding and following, I am, it’s worth admitting, attempting to associate Sub Pop Records with the accomplishments of people, groups or artists who have worked with or for us, thereby taking some largely undeserved credit for their accomplishments…]

But, hope (and our desire for just this sort of prominent music industry recognition) blooms springs eternal! Which is why, this year, with the nomination of our own Sasha Barr (one of Sub Pop’s Art Directors, and a member of our profoundly talented and surprisingly sensitive Art Department) in the category of “Best Boxed Or Special Limited Edition Package,” we are ready to love again. We are, it turns out, SO ready to love again that we have asked Sasha, and he has reluctantly agreed, to document his experience this weekend and through Monday’s awards presentation in photos. In turn, we will be foisting the favorites of these on you through our various and powerful social media channels (likely: Instagram and Twitter, both @subpop). You can, and we very much hope you will, follow along with our Mr. Barr on his journey as a Grammy nominee from the comfort (or other conditions) of your own home or mobile device! It should be fun and will, undoubtedly, be at least a little strange.

Nominated for his art direction of the Deluxe Edition of Father John Misty’s 2015 album I Love You, Honeybear, we are exceedingly proud of Sasha, and Father John Misty, and the amazing illustration work by Stacey Rozich featured throughout the album’s art. So much so that win or lose (as unimaginable as that latter thing may be), we have every intention of very thoroughly celebrating Sasha on his return. If he does not bring home the Grammy he deserves, we will present him with our own, less official and recognizable, though no less merited and certainly way more homemade, award. It will probably be called a Grumpy or something.

So, good luck, Sasha! We’ll all be watching, very closely!

We do, in fact, want what we haven’t got (more than that one time).

Please enjoy Father John Misty’s incredible Colbert Late Night performance of “Holy Shit” from internationally acclaimed album I Love You, Honeybear.  That is all.

JK!  Of course that’s not all!

Tickets are on sale today for his previously announced North American spring tour, beginning March 30th in Santa Ana, CA at the Observatory and ending April 30th in Orlando, FL at the Beacham. Support for these dates come from Tess & Dave.  Additionally, dates for his previously announced European tour run May 11th - May 31st. (complete list below)

But wait, there’s more! (horns blow triumphantly!) Father John Misty has also earned a Brit Award nomination for “Best International Male Solo Artist” alongside Kendrick Lamar, Drake, and The Weeknd.
 
AND… he’s the cover star of Under The Radar’s “Best of 2015” issue alongside Ellie Roswell from Wolf Alice (view here).

I Love You, Honeybear is available now on CD / LP / 2xLP / Deluxe 2xLP in Europe from Bella Union and everywhere else from Sub Pop via Father John Misty’s webstore,  Sub Pop Mega Mart, iTunes, Google Play, and Amazon. 

Tour Dates
Mar. 30 - Santa Ana, CA - The Observatory* [Sold Out]
Mar. 31 - Santa Ana, CA - The Observatory*
Apr. 01 - Oakland, CA - Fox Theatre* [Sold Out]
Apr. 02 - Oakland, CA - Fox Theatre*
Apr. 05 - Vancouver, BC - Orpheum Theatre* [Sold Out]
Apr. 06 - Seattle, WA - The Paramount*
Apr. 08 - Salt Lake City, UT - The Depot*
Apr. 09 - Denver, CO - Ellie Caulkins Opera House*
Apr. 12 - Kansas City, MO - Uptown Theatre*
Apr. 14 - Chicago, IL - Riviera Theatre* [Sold Out]
Apr. 15 - Chicago, IL - Riviera Theatre*
Apr. 16 - Minneapolis, MN - Northrop Auditorium* [Sold Out]
Apr. 17 - Urbana, IL - Foelinger Auditorium @ University of Illinois*
Apr. 20 - Toronto, ON - Massey Hall* [Sold Out]
Apr. 21 - Montreal, QC - Metropolis*
Apr. 22 - Boston, MA - House of Blues* [Sold Out]
Apr. 23 - Philadelphia, PA - The Fillmore* [Sold Out]
Apr. 25 - Washington, DC - Lincoln Theatre* [Sold Out]
Apr. 26 - Washington, DC - Lincoln Theatre*
Apr. 27 - Charlotte, NC - The Fillmore*
Apr. 29 - Atlanta, GA - The Tabernacle*
Apr. 30 - Orlando, FL - The Beacham*
May 11 - Leeds, UK - O2 Academy
May 12 - Glasgow, UK O2 Academy
May 13 - Manchester, UK - Albert Hall [Sold Out]
May 14 - Gateshead, UK - The Stage Gateshead
May 15 - Nottingham, UK - Rock City
May 17 - Bristol, UK - Colston Hall
May 18 - London, UK - The Roundhouse [Sold Out]
May 19 - London, UK - The Roundhouse [Sold Out]
May 20 - London, UK - The Roundhouse
May 21 - Southampton, UK - O2 Guildhall
May 23 - Paris, FR - Alhambra
May 24 - Utrect, NL - Tivoli Vredenburg - Ronda
May 25 - Berlin, DE - Postbanhof
May 27 - Aarhus, DK - Train [Sold Out]
May 28 - Copenhagen, DK - Falconer Theatre [Sold Out]
May 29 - Copenhagen, DK - Falconer Theatre
May 30 - Gothenburg, SE - Trädgårn [Moved From Pustervik]
May 31 - Oslo, NO - Sentrum Scene
* w / Tess & Dave

Go here for ticket links.