Pierce Brothers - into the great unknown (2021)

Melbourne folk-pop outfit Pierce Brothers have well and truly put the events of 2020 to good use, emerging from the year that has been with news of a new record, with Into the Great Unknown set to arrive in March of 2021.

Having shared singles such as “Kanko” and “Dentist” in previous months, the revered duo today shared their latest track, with “one” serving as the newest taster of their sophomore release.

Recorded at Jan Skubizeski’s Red Moon Studios from April to June (that is, between the Victorian lockdowns), the process saw Jack and Pat spending most of their days working hard in the studio, with evenings in the guest cottage working on new material.

“We’d finish a long day recording a track, then have dinner together, share a bottle of red and either work on the track some more, or we’d retire to the cottage and write until we went to sleep,” Jack recalls. “We spent hours discussing and exploring new sounds and experimenting with a secondary recording rig in the cottage, so we could test out new and exciting things before taking them to the studio the next day.

“This made for some beautifully experimental explorations throughout the album, optimised by the stunning instrumental track ‘Réflecteu’r. Pat used his time to mock up strings arrangements and horn ideas that we then took to some incredibly talented people to bring to life!”

Utilising the talents of Ross Iwrin (The Cat Empire, Angus and Julia Stone, Passenger) with the record’s string and horn arrangements, the pair explain that the album has now seen them reach greater heights than ever before.

“The string arrangements realised a whole avenue that we’d always wanted to explore,” Pat notes, “Inspired a lot by Gang Of Youths’ brilliant 2017 album Go Farther in Lightness, and expanded the depth of the album in ways that we’d never tried.”