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Placebo preview first album in over eight years with second single "Surrounded By Spies"

09 November 2021, 12:47 | Written by Cerys Kenneally

Placebo have delivered new track "Surrounded By Spies", which arrives as the second preview of their long-awaited eighth album Never Let Me Go.

"Surrounded By Spies" is Placebo's first new release since announcing their first album in over eight years Never Let Me Go last week, and will feature on the record alongside September's comeback single "Beautiful James".

Brian Molko says of the new single, "I began writing the lyrics when I discovered my neighbours were spying on me on behalf of parties with a nefarious agenda. I then began to ponder the countless ways in which our privacy has been eroded and stolen since the introduction of worldwide CCTV cameras that now employ racist facial recognition technologies; the rise of the internet and the cellphone, which has turned practically every user into a paparazzo and spectators in their own lives, and how we have mostly all offered up personal information to enormous multinationals whose sole intent is to exploit us."

Molko adds, "I used the cut-up technique invented by William S Burroughs and popularized in modern song by David Bowie. It’s a true story told through a lens of paranoia, complete disgust for modern society’s values and the deification of surveillance capitalism. The narrator is at the end of their tether, hopeless and afraid, completely at odds with our newfound progress and the god of money."

Never Let Me Go will follow Placebo's 2013 album Loud Like Love,

Tracklist:

  1. Forever Chemicals
  2. Beautiful James
  3. Hugz
  4. Happy Birthday In The Sky
  5. The Prodigal
  6. Surrounded By Spies
  7. Try Better Next Time
  8. Sad White Reggae
  9. Twin Demons
  10. Chemtrails
  11. This Is What You Wanted
  12. Went Missing
  13. Fix Yourself
"Surrounded By Spies" is out now. Placebo's Never Let Me Go album 25 March 2022, and is available to pre-order now. They'll play London's O2 Brixton Academy on 26 and 27 November 2022. Visit placeboworld.co.uk for more information.
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