Marina And The Diamonds is about to return with a new album and from the whimsical title, Froot, it looks set to be a resurgence of the more fantastical side of the singer/songwriter’s musical output. Scarily, it’s been a whopping five years since her debut album, The Family Jewels, introduced her indie pop abstractions to an unsuspecting audience too young to pick up on the vocal similarities with the amazing Kate Bush. Five years on and there seems to be no let up from Marina as she steadies herself for her third album.
The new record has been confirmed for release on CD, digital download and as part of a limited 7″ vinyl boxset on the 6th April 2014, following up on 2012’s Elekra Heart. To add to the buildup of the impending release, Marina will also be firing out six tracks from Froot to anyone that pre-orders it in monthly installments under the auspices of what she’s calling the Froot Of The Month. So far we’ve had the title track, Happy and Immortals, all of which are also available to download and preview on iTunes.
The album has been produced by just Marina and Faultline’s David Costen this time around, stripping things back from the varied credits that appeared on Elektra Heart. It’s also been written exclusively by the singer, which is again a big departure from the number of co-written songs on the previous album, which is a pretty good indication that she’s starting to get a bit more comfortable in the driving seat of her music.
You can check out the full track list below for all of the songs on the new album and you can also see the music video for Froot, the lead track from the album. The video, as ever, sees Marina in the centre of the action, flouncing around in a selection of dresses that says a lot about the artists innate fantasist sentimentality. The vocals are an equal mix of accented enunciation and high pitch extremities, which construct the mad genius framework for the equally eccentric vocals making up the catchy pop track.
What we’ve always sort of liked about Marina And The Diamonds is that she’s not afraid to sing about the things that are clearly bugging her in her life and the latest release is no difference. Immortals is a dramatic, romance tryst with immortality that is more about the sadness about the concept of our short lives than any real hope that vampire-like longevity could actually be attainable.
It’s added to by Happy, which is her take on finding happiness in life somewhere along the way despite your own peculiarities and unique persuasions. It’s a desperate plea to persuade yourself that you’re happy, or that there is happiness to be found in the cruelties and agonies of life. That if you can just hold on to something and believe in it hard enough then you can convince yourself of anything, despite the nagging reality that you’ve decided to block out. It’s slow and beautifully sung with a cracked fragility that’s more real life than the words themselves.
At the moment, there’s no word on a UK tour to accompany the release of Froot, but Marina will be showing up at a series of big US festivals around the time of the album’s arrival. She’ll be playing at SXSW and Lollapalooza in March, Coachella in April, Boston Calling in May and Governor’s Ball in June, which sort of looks like she might be favouring the US market at the moment, but we’re sure she’ll be back playing in the UK during the summer months, and we’ll update as soon as details become available.
Froot Track list:
1. Happy
2. Froot
3. I’m A Ruin
4. Blue
5. Forget
6. Gold
7. Can’t Pin Me Down
8. Solitaire
9. Better Than That
10. Weeds
11. Savages
12. Immortal
