Sam Fender has shared plans to take a break to get his voice “as good as possible” before making another album and releasing a “fuck loads of new tunes next year”.
- READ MORE: Sam Fender – ‘People Watching’ review: reflective and perceptive indie rock from North Shields’ shining star
The comments from the Geordie singer-songwriter came as he headlined Wythenshawe Park on Saturday (August 16), a performance that followed him being forced to cancel a string of shows this summer due to a vocal haemorrhage.
At the time, he said the experience had been “incredibly frustrating” after he pulled out of scheduled appearances at Rock Werchter, Down The Rabbit Hole, NOS Alive, and the Montreux Jazz Festival.
However, this weekend, Fender seemed optimistic about the health of his voice and looked ahead to making another album.
Addressing the 30,000-strong crowd in Manchester, he told them (via Clash): “I’m gonna go away at the end of this lot of shows and sort my shit out and get my voice as good as possible and make another album and fuck loads of new tunes next year.”
He added: “I wanna make it the greatest time ever.”
Earlier this year, Fender appeared on Apple Music 1‘s The Zane Lowe Show, opening up about working with The War On Drugs‘ Adam Granduciel, and revealing that he was already working on the follow-up to ‘People Watching’.
“Now I’m ready to do another one,” he said. “I just want to get back in the studio, if I’m honest. I’ve got a load of new songs already.”
As for what fans could expect from the upcoming material, he told Lowe: “There’s two avenues I’ve got right now on the go. I’ve got a real stripped-back bunch of tunes, which really I couldn’t build on. They need to just be on their own. And then the other side’s a bit more thrashy. So I’m thinking about two records at once at the moment.
“We’ll see. But I would love to do a real stripped-back [LP] because I mean, that’s how I started. The band kind of only came together once I’ve actually recorded my first sort of single. …Before then, I toured for a while. When I was 18, 19, 20, those sort of three years, I was just on my own with an acoustic. That’s how I started everything. So yeah, I would love to go back to that.
“There’s a part of us that really yearns for, maybe it’s a little solo tour just on my own with an acoustic maybe to see what that’s like,” he added.
He later followed up those comments by continuing to tease a new sound, saying he was “desperate” to lean into more of a punk-inspired concept going forward.
In a four-star review of his most recent record ‘People Watching’, NME shared: “Reflective, analytical and vulnerable, ‘People Watching’ does exactly what the title may suggest: takes stock of the characters, friends and loved ones who have made Fender the person he is today. He approaches each track with sensitivity as he looks back on his life so far – perhaps even with an inkling of guilt – and contemplates who he may be next.”
In other news, Fender is currently a bookies’ favourite to headline Glastonbury 2027.
