Last year, Gorillaz returned to the music scene with their seventh album, Song Machine, Season One: Strange Timez. Now, the band’s lead vocalist Damon Albarn is stepping out on his own again for his second solo album, The Nearer The Fountain, More Pure The Stream Flows. The project is locked in for a November 12 release date, but Albarn has already been dropping singles, including the fourth, “Royal Morning Blue.”
The track is much more upbeat than the previous new ones Albarn has released so far. In a press release, he noted that the song was created during a trip to Iceland after he gained inspiration from the wintry oceanside that surrounded him. He added that it was “directly inspired by the view from Albarn’s position at the piano looking out over the sea, [and] captures the wonder of rain turning into snow before his eyes.”
He continued, “That’s why the song opens with ‘Rain turning into snow,’ because it’s that moment, that feeling. In all the darkness that we have experienced, that was such a beautiful, positive thing.”
The release of “Royal Morning Blue” comes after Albarn shared “Polaris,” “Particles,” and “The Nearer The Fountain, More Pure The Stream Flows.”
You can can hear the new track in the video above.
The Nearer The Fountain, More Pure The Stream Flows is out 11/12 via Transgressive Records. Pre-order it here.
Gorillaz is a Warner Music artist. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group.