Zola Jesus Announces New Album Okovi, Shares New Track “Exhumed”: Listen

Zola Jesus has announced the follow-up to 2014’s Taiga. Okovi is out September 8 via Sacred Bones. She’s also shared the first single—listen to “Exhumed” below. The album is her return to Sacred Bones—her last album was released on Mute, and in a statement, she called Sacred Bones “the closest group of people [she’ll] ever have to blood-bound family.” It features contributions from longtime collaborator Alex DeGroot, WIFE, Pedestrian Deposit’s Shannon Kennedy, and percussionist Ted Byrnes. Zola Jesus has also plotted a fall tour, which includes her appearance at Basilica SoundScape. Below, find Zola Jesus’ artist statement, the Okovi tracklist, and her upcoming tour dates.

Zola Jesus:

Last year, I moved back to the woods in Wisconsin where I was raised. I built a little house just steps away from where my dilapidated childhood tree fort is slowly recombining into earth. Okovi was fed by this return to roots and several very personal traumas.

While writing Okovi, I endured people very close to me trying to die, and others trying desperately not to. Meanwhile, I was fighting through a haze so thick I wasn’t sure I’d find my way to the other side. Death, in all of its masks, has been encircling everyone I love, and with it the questions of legacy, worth, and will.

Okovi is a Slavic word for shackles. We’re all shackled to something—to life, to death, to bodies, to minds, to illness, to people, to birthright, to duty. Each of us born with a unique debt, and we have until we die to pay it back.  Without this cost, what gives us the right to live? And moreover, what gives us the right to die? Are we really even free to choose?

This album is a deeply personal snapshot of loss, reconciliation, and a sympathy for the chains that keep us all grounded to the unforgiving laws of nature. To bring it to life, I decided to enlist the help of Alex DeGroot, who has been the only constant in my live band and helped mix the Stridulum EP back in 2010. It will be released on Sacred Bones, the closest group of people I’ll ever have to blood-bound family.

Okovi:

01 Doma
02 Exhumed
03 Soak
04 Ash to Bone
05 Witness
06 Siphon
07 Veka
08 Wiseblood
09 NMO
10 Remains
11 Half Life

Zola Jesus:

9-16 Hudson, NY – Basilica SoundScape
9-21 San Diego, CA – Casbah
9-22 Phoenix, AZ – Valley Bar
9-23 Sante Fe, NM – Meow Wolf
9-25 Dallas, TX – Kessler Theater
9-26 Austin, TX – North Door
9-27 New Orleans, LA – Siberia
9-28 Atlanta, GA – Aisle 5
9-29 Asheville, NC – The Mothlight
9-30 Washington, DC – U Street
10-01 Boston, MA – ICA Boston
10-03 Philadelphia, PA – PhilaMOCA
10-04 Brooklyn, NY – Rough Trade
10-06 Toronto, Ontario - Longboat Hall
10-07 Detroit, MI – Assemble Sound Church
10-08 Chicago, IL – Thalia Hall
10-9 Madison, WI – Majestic Theatre
10-10 St. Paul, MN – Amsterdam Bar & Hall
10-11 Omaha, NE – Waiting Room
10-14 Salt Lake City, UT – Urban Lounge
10-16 Oakland, CA – Starline Social Club
10-17 San Francisco, CA – Independent
10-19 Seattle, WA – Crocodile
10-20 Portland, OR – The Old Church
10-21 Vancouver, British Columbia - Venue

Watch Zola Jesus perform on Pitchfork.tv:

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