Clark Announces New Album Playground in a Lake, Shares Song: Listen

Clark has announced a new album. Playground in a Lake is out March 26 via Deutsche Grammophon. The album features string ensembles, Oliver Coates playing cello, and Grizzly Bear’s Chris Taylor on clarinet. Listen to the new song “Small” below.

“I’ve always wanted to record strings, but feel there’s this baggage with classical music,” Clark said in a statement about the new album. “Even though I’ve taught myself how to read and write sheet music, I’m not putting that genre, or any other genre on a silver platter. I’m not from an institutionalised contingent who deem a narrow range of instruments ‘the real stuff’ and everything else worthless commercial pop. I take what I admire from that world and then move on. I’m just using it as another colour.” He continued:

So, I started thinking about my favourite kind of string arrangements, like Scott Walker records, where they exist amongst contrasting elements. Then I started to approach the album from a dark folk place, also with this heavy ’70s synth style. Then came the improvisation of musique concrète, and some of my favourite modern classical and sound design obsessions, and then it clicked.

Read about Clark in Pitchfork’s list of “The 50 Best IDM Albums of All Time.”