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07/21/2026 | Press release | Distributed by Public on 07/21/2026 09:53

Sylvan Esso Embrace The Pain On Ow ∞, New Album Out September 11 via Psychic Hotline

Second Single "Concrete Glen" Available Now

LISTEN | WATCH

Full Band Tour Set For 2026-2027, Good Moon Festival Takes Over North Carolina October 8-10

Early Ow ∞ Listening Events Scheduled Around The Globe On September 3

DURHAM, NC - July 21st, 2026 : Today, Sylvan Esso announce their first new album in four years, and their first to be released on their own, on their own record label. Arriving September 11th via Psychic Hotline, Ow ∞ is a trust fall into our dystopian present, past and future: arms wide open, embracing and absorbing the pain of cities under water or on fire, and piecing oneself back together as a tactile, scotch-taped collage of memories, ephemera, Y2K-era burned CDs and backseat makeouts. Produced by Sylvan Esso's Amelia Meath and Nick Sanborn, Ow ∞ is also the longest the band has ever spent writing a record, yet it arrives with an intense immediacy that is messy, hellish and free, metabolizing a life of making music with people into making art that you just love.

Pre-order Ow ∞ , listen to new single "Concrete Glen" via Psychic Hotline, and watch the video: HERE

Created, reimagined and revisited nearly every day since 2022, in the woods of their studio Betty's in Chapel Hill, NC, Ow ∞ was born from a period of ceaseless experimentation, improvisation and collaboration. The result is both a technicolor totem of personal destruction, and an ecstatic invitation to party - like recent single "Hot Slob," hailed as "sweaty, snotty and hedonistically brash…an infectious and defiant ode to living messily and having nothing figured out," said The New York Times. Across the album's 12 songs, including the newly released "Concrete Glen" - weaving in a sample of "Svefn-g-englar" by Sigur Rós (a band that soundtracked much of Meath's teenage makeouts) and recounting a dizzy night out turned hypnotic and surreal - most of the tracks are Meath's first vocal takes, while arrangements and ideas are excavated, painted over and held together by the largest community of musicians Sylvan Esso have ever worked with on an LP.

Featuring six different drummers in total, as well as live guitar, bass, keys, vibraphone, woodwinds, Innato, organ, piano and electronics, Meath and Sanborn are joined by Daniel Aged (Frank Ocean, Dijon), BJ Burton (Bon Iver, Charli XCX), Matt Douglas (the Mountain Goats), Glenn Kotche (Wilco), Jake Luppen (Hippo Campus, Samia), TJ Maiani (Weyes Blood, Neneh Cherry), James Mapley-Brittle (GRRL),Buddy Ross(Frank Ocean, Bon Iver), Jenn Wasner (Wye Oak, Flock of Dimes) and Joe Westerlund(Megafaun) throughout the record, filling hard drives with 5-10 songs at a time, some sticking and some not. Nothing was sacred, until everything was. As Amelia Meath says:

"One of my favorite ways of producing in general is to come up with an idea and then take out a third of it. One, it makes things interesting and exciting, but also it makes your ear ask a question. And it kind of forces the listener to be creative as well. To try to fill that space with something, which I find as a listener to be really exciting and interesting. Particularly with pop music, because it's all about fulfilling a promise. You know this melodic structure, you know, we're going to the four here. Not doing it is always the thing that makes people fall in love with a song or a person.

Living hurts forever, and then it stops. But also it's a little silly. And that's how I feel. If you're going to keep participating in the world, and in your life, you have to commit to being hurt. And if you aren't putting yourself in the way of potential hurt, you miss out on a lot of potential opportunities. So in some ways it's like a rallying cry, saying 'I'm gonna get hurt forever, and that's okay.'"

During their life as Sylvan Esso, Amelia Meath and Nick Sanborn have made songs from a tightrope, a central tension of the physical and existential, cerebral and instinctual from which everything else spiraled. But in the chaos ofOw ∞ is comfort in the fact that - after multiple GRAMMY® nominations, four acclaimed LPs, nearly a billion streams and wide-ranging collaborations with everyone from Arooj Aftab to Maggie Rogers, Tyler Childers, Reyna Tropical, Remi Wolf, Moses Sumney, The Postal Service, Rostam and more - they have figured out all the avenues in which they can take control, put things out the way they want to, with the people they choose, in their own studio and through their own label. For an album that wrestles so much with the out-of-control nature of being alive, Ow ∞meets the duo at a time where, finally, they have complete control over what Sylvan Esso can be.

Ahead of the release of Ow ∞, fans can experience an early listen to the record in full at a series of listening events around the globe on September 3rd. Find the initial list of locations below, and details at sylvanesso.com.

Following the release of Ow ∞, Sylvan Esso will bring the music to a full-band tourspanning more than two dozen shows across North America and beyond in 2026 and 2027. The new line-up was previewed during a sold-out, week-long residency at LA's Sid the Cat Auditorium last month, and stops on the upcoming tour include NYC's Brooklyn Paramount, Chicago's Salt Shed, LA's Wiltern and more. See the full list of tour dates below, with tickets and information at sylvanesso.com.

Sylvan Esso and Psychic Hotline will also present the first biennial Good Moon festival since 2024 this fall, taking over four venues throughout their hometown of Durham, NC, from October 8th-10th. Anchored by three nights at Durham Performing Arts Center - two headlined by Sylvan Esso, one headlined by Tyler Childers, with special guests Meshell Ndegeocello, aja monet and Silvana Estrada - the lineup features MJ Lenderman, Rodrigo Amarante, Leenalchi, Tash LC, William Tyler & Yasmin Williams, Jacques Greene, Annie & the Caldwells, Circuit des Yeux and many more. Tickets and details are available at goodmoonnc.com.

Ow ∞ Tracklist

Entertainment & Coca-Cola

Flood Season

Hot Slob

Concrete Glen

Back Again

Ribbon

Sledge

Right to Left

Good at Pain

Jessica

On & On

Plastic Sword

Ow ∞ Listening Events | September 3rd, 2026

Mexico City - 99Recs (Roma)

Taipei - Chao Bar Record Store

Tokyo - IPPEN

London - Cafe 1001

Berlin - Unkompress

San Diego - Part Time Lover

Los Angeles - ISC HQ

New York - Mr. Melo

Chicago - Parachute

Philadelphia - Percy Sound Lounge

Portland - Favorite Neighbors

Austin - Equipment Room

Dallas - Shyboy Hi-Fi

Omaha - Oto Hi-Fi Lounge

West Palm Beach - Rust & Wax

+ More To Be Announced

Sylvan Esso Tour Dates

Jul 31 - Burlington, VT - Burlington Waterfront Park

Sep 12 - Abiquiu, NM - Blossoms & Bones

Sept 20 - Brighton, UK - Resident Music (In-Store Performance)

Sept 21 - London, UK - Rough Trade (In-Store Performance)

Oct 1 - Atlanta, GA - The Eastern

Oct 2-3 - Asheville, NC - The Orange Peel

Oct 5-6 - Washington, DC - 9:30 Club

Oct 8-10 - Durham, NC - Good Moon

Oct 12 - Philadelphia, PA - Franklin Music Hall

Oct 14 - Brooklyn, NY - Brooklyn Paramount

Oct 15 - New Haven, CT - College Street Music Hall

Oct 16 - Portland, ME - State Theatre

Oct 17 - Boston, MA - Citizens House of Blues

Oct 19 - Toronto, ON - HISTORY

Oct 21 - Milwaukee, WI - Riverside Theater

Oct 22 - Chicago, IL - The Salt Shed Indoors

Oct 23-24 - Minneapolis, MN - First Avenue

Oct 31-Nov 1 - Kakegawa, JP - Festival de Frue

Feb 19 - Seattle, WA - Paramount Theatre

Feb 20 - Vancouver, BC - Vogue Theatre

Feb 22-23 - Portland, OR - McMenamins Crystal Ballroom

Feb 25 - Oakland, CA - Fox Theater

Feb 26 - Los Angeles, CA - The Wiltern

Feb 27 - Santa Ana, CA - Observatory

Mar 1 - Del Mar, CA - The Sound

Mar 2 - Phoenix, AZ - The Van Buren

Mar 4 - Salt Lake City, UT - Rockwell at the Complex

Mar 5-6 - Denver, CO - Ogden Theatre

Mar 8 - Austin, TX - ACL Live at The Moody Theater

Mar 9 - Dallas, TX - House of Blues

Mar 11 - New Orleans, LA - Tipitina's

Mar 12 - Birmingham, AL - Iron City

Mar 13 - Nashville, TN - Brooklyn Bowl

*Newly announced dates in BOLD

Follow Sylvan Esso

Official Site

Instagram

Facebook

YouTube

For more information, please contact Matt Hanks, Greg Jakubik or Annie Mickum at

Shore Fire Media, 718-522-7171

Shore Fire Media Inc. published this content on July 21, 2026, and is solely responsible for the information contained herein. Distributed via Public Technologies (PUBT), unedited and unaltered, on July 21, 2026 at 15:53 UTC. If you believe the information included in the content is inaccurate or outdated and requires editing or removal, please contact us at [email protected]