Violent Femmes have announced that their first full-length album in over 15 years, We Can Do Anything, is scheduled to drop on March 4, 2016.
The forthcoming album follows this past April's Happy New Year EP which was the first new material of any kind the band had released in 15 years. After that EP got the ball rolling, it was only a matter of time before the band dropped a full-length effort.
The band, including original members Gordon Gano and Brian Ritchie, recorded the forthcoming album in studios in Brooklyn, Nashville, Los Angeles, Milwaukee and Denver while on tour with Barenaked Ladies this past year.
The new album's cover art is the work of Barenaked Ladies' Kevin Hearn, who also played accordion on a few tracks.
Jeff Hamilton, who has played multiple instruments in the band's constantly evolving backing band, produced the album while John Agnello mixed it.
As Rolling Stone reports, Gano curated material for a handful of songs on the forthcoming album from his archives of old cassette demos and journals including "Big Car" and "I Could Be Anything."
We Can Do Anything also features songwriting from Sam Hollander, Dave Katz and Kevin Griffin of Better Than Ezra, reports Rolling Stone. The new release also has one cover song, "What You Really Mean," which was written by Gano's folk-singing sister Cynthia Gayneau.
The band first broke their hiatus back in 2013 with a reunion performance at Coachella. That show boasted the trio's original lineup of Gano, Ritchie and drummer Victor DeLorenzo, but as Rolling Stone notes DeLorenzo was eventually replaced by Brian Viglione who has drummed with the Dresden Dolls and Nine Inch Nails.
Violent Femmes are also promising an "epic" world tour in 2016, Brooklyn Vegan reports. As of now, only Australian dates have been announced.
We Can Do Anything tracklist:
01. "Memory"
02. "I Could Be Anything"
03. "Issues"
04. "Holy Ghost"
05. "What You Really Mean"
06. "Foothills"
07. "Traveling Solves Everything"
08. "Big Car"
09. "Untrue Love"
10. "I'm Not Done"
What better time to revisit the band's discography than in the months preceeding a new release? Watch a vintage live recording of "Blister in the Sun" below.
