Cult heroes The Underground Youth (Fuzz Club) share "For You Are The One" video ahead of new LP

The Underground Youth – the Manchester-born, Berlin-based group led by Craig Dyer – are today sharing ‘For You Are The One’, the latest single to be lifted from their incoming ‘The Falling’ LP. The Underground Youth’s tenth record is due for release via Fuzz Club Records on March 12th and sees the band trade their visceral post-punk melancholy for a more refined and stripped-back sound that, instead, enters the world of romantic, shadowy folk-noir.

A marked departure from the primal intensity often heard on the band’s previous work, ‘The Falling’ showcases a softer, more cinematic musical landscape, one shaped by acoustic guitars, piano, accordion and a heavy presence of violin and string arrangements. Talking about ‘For You Are The One’, Craig says: “I wanted this bouncing, drunken, upbeat track for the record, something unlike anything I’d written before. The addition of the violin to the album really enhanced each and every track, but for me this one stands out as the song most affected by this change in sound.”

With nine full-lengths behind them since their formation in 2008, the band has acquired a dedicated, cult-like global following (the ‘Mademoiselle’ album, for example, reaching 7million views on YouTube). Off the back of their last album, ‘Montage Images of Lust & Fear’, The Underground Youth set off on a 50+ date European tour, their first run of shows around Asia and were also in the middle of their first USA/Canada tour when Covid-19 hit, sadly cutting it short. With the original plans of heading into the studio upon their return from their US tour grinding to a halt – the tour cancelled midway through and followed by months of isolation in their Berlin apartments – the album is very much a product of the distressing and unfamiliar world we now find ourselves in.

As a result of the pandemic, ‘The Falling’ was recorded between Craig and guitarist/producer Leo Kaage’s apartments-turned-home-studios (also in the band is Craig’s wife, the artist Olya Dyer, and Max James, who formerly played in Johnny Marr’s live band): “The album sees me going back to my writing approach from our earliest records, writing the demos as stripped back acoustic tracks at home. What started out as a set of romantic and deeply personal songs also took on the surrounding frustrations and feelings towards the situation we found ourselves in. Born from the heartbreak of how the worldwide pandemic has changed the industry we were thriving within, this album also functions as a love letter to the past.”