Indie-rock heroes Spoon are back with two new songs. The Austin, Texas, band just surprise-released “Chateau Blues” and “Guess I’m Fallin’ In Love,” quintessential examples of the kind of sharp guitar bangers the band has been doing well for decades. It’s the first new music they’ve put out since their excellent 2022 album, Lucifer on the Sofa. That album was a potent return to straight-ahead, band-in-a-room rock after a couple records that leaned more into studio craft, and everything about their new music suggests their next album will continue in that vein. “The songs that we’ve done so far for the first half of the record are very rock-forward,” says frontman Britt Daniel. “They’ve been very extroverted-feeling.”
Daniel says “Chateau Blues” began as a “as a country bar-band sort of swing,” and then evolved into a driving rocker. “I had this vision one morning as I was waking up of ‘Chateau Blues’ as a rock song. So I rewrote it as a song led by a riff — same key, same lyrics, almost the same melody — but the riff gave it life, and we added that Topper Headon-esque machine-gun beat, and it was suddenly like, ‘OK, yeah, this is definitely the way the song is meant to be.’ It’s a song about a man in his self-imposed exile, written from the point of view of his Uber driver.”
“Guess I’m Fallin’ In Love,” which shares a title with an old Velvet Underground tune, is moodier and droney but no less catchy. “Musically, it’s sort of like a modal spaghetti-western-type thing,” Daniel says. “It has this sort of low, slightly evil vibe to it. It’s about being wary of falling in love, feeling a bit unsold on the idea even as you feel like it might be happening. It started with the framing story of One Thousand and One Nights for the starting point and I ran from that.”
The band has been dividing time between their longtime home base of Austin and drummer Jim Eno’s new home of Providence, Rhode Island, working with producer Justin Meldal-Johnsen (Beck, Nine Inch Nails, St. Vincent). Daniel says the album is about halfway done, and doesn’t have a release date or title yet. “If you went by what I’ve been listening to the most recently, it’s a cross between CCR and Jessica Pratt, but I don’t know if you hear that in those songs,” he says.
While almost everything they’ve done so far is upbeat, it’s not all tough guitar rock, particularly a slow song Daniel really likes called “Midnight Radio Stars.” “My mom told me we should write some ballads. So i got to it,” says Daniel. He notes that Flaming Lips producer Dave Fridmann, who produced a pair of Spoon records in the 2010s, gave him the same advice: “He suggested I write a song like ‘Are You Lonely Tonight.’ I don’t think it’s like that, but it’s cool. It’s a lovely song. We worked on it for two or three days and I got into that mood. I felt sultry by the end of it.”
Lucifer on the Sofa felt like a career capstone for Spoon, attaining nearly universal critical acclaim, making it into the Top Ten of the rock album charts, and notching a Grammy nomination for Best Rock Album. Daniel says he found attending the Grammy ceremony itself “a bit stale,” adding, “It doesn’t feel like it’s made for anything other than the TV. They don’t sell drinks in the arena that night. It’s not a vibe.”
Still, the night did involve one memory he’ll be able to treasure for life. “We got to meet Paul McCartney,” he says. “We’d never never met him before. He came out and talked to us. I think someone told him there were some guys over there who want to meet you. But, you know, what can I say? The guy is 80-plus years old, and when we left the party, he was dancing. He’d been dancing all night and he was still dancing. It was really pretty magical to see.”
Along with releasing the new songs, Spoon are also kicking off a month-long tour with the Pixies, one of the all-time great indie-rock bands and a huge influence on Daniel growing up. “This is something I’m not jaded about at all,” he says of the chance to hi the road with his heroes. “When I was in the later years of high school and into college, the Pixies and the Velvet Underground were it. That was how I wanted to write songs. That was the peak of cool for me.”
Both the Pixies and Spoon have enjoyed long, successful careers — the Pixies’ first record came out in 1987, Spoon made their debut in 1996. But it wasn’t always easy sledding for Spoon. In the Nineties, they were signed and quickly dropped by major label Elektra Records, and summed up the experience with a song called “The Agony of Lafitte” (famously named after their former A&R guy). In 2000, they were the subject of a classic Village Voice article about the perils of indie rock in its post-1990s-boom phase that made Spoon beloved underdogs to many music fans. The band bounced back and went on a run of great albums beginning with 2002’s Kill the Moonlight (Number 123 on Rolling Stone‘s 250 Best Albums of the 21st Century), and they’re still going stronger than ever today. Now, they’re one year away from celebrating their 30th anniversary.
“We hadn’t really hit our stride when that [Village Voice] article came out, but nobody really knew that at the time. We didn’t either,” Daniel says. “It’s always seemed like the right thing to do to make another record. Whenever we needed to take a break, we do. Maybe that’s it. And the break doesn’t need to be very long… Maybe we’re just fuckin’ well-adjusted.”
Spoon Tour Dates With Pixies
Aug. 26 — Santa Ana, CA @ Observatory SOLD OUT
Aug. 27 — San Diego, CA @ Gallagher Square
Aug. 28 — Berkeley, CA @ The Greek Theatre at UC Berkeley
Aug. 30 — Troutdale, OR @ McMenamins Edgefield
Aug. 30 — Bonner, MT @ KettleHouse Amphitheater
Sept. 2 — Morrison, CO @ Red Rocks Amphitheatre
Sept. 4 — Oklahoma City, OK @ The Zoo Amphitheatre
Sept. 5 — Austin, TX @ Moody Amphitheater
Sept. 6 — Houston, TX @ White Oak Music Hall
Sept. 8 — Birmingham, AL @ Avondale Brewing Company
Sept. 9 — Raleigh, NC @ Red Hat Amphitheater
Sept. 10 — Asheville, NC @ Asheville Yards
Sept. 12 — Pittsburgh, PA @ Stage AE
Sept. 14 — Asbury Park, NJ @ See.Hear.Now Festival
Sept. 15 — Chicago, IL @ The Salt Shed
Sept. 16 — St. Louis, MO @ Stifel Theatre
Sept. 17 — Nashville, TN @ The Pinnacle
Sept. 19 — Atlanta, GA @ Shaky Knees Festival 2025
Sept. 20 — Atlanta, GA @ Center Stage SOLD OUT
