David Byrne is proud to announce Who Is the Sky?, his first new album since 2018's highly acclaimed and award-winning American Utopia, which will be released on September 5th on Matador Records. The album was produced by Grammy-winning producer Kid Harpoon (Harry Styles, Miley Cyrus), while the 12 songs were arranged by members of New York chamber ensemble Ghost Train Orchestra.  Musical friends old and new, including St. Vincent, Hayley Williams of Paramore, Tom Skinner, drummer of The Smile, and Mauro Refosco, drummer of American Utopia, are also featured on Who Is the Sky?, which is led by the infectious single Everybody Laughs.  Along with the song, Byrne has also released the official video, directed by multimedia artist Gabriel Barcia-Colombo.

“Someone I know said, 'David, you use the word “everyone” a lot. I suppose I do that to take an anthropological look at life in New York as we know it,” says Byrne. “Everyone lives, dies, laughs, cries, sleeps and stares at the ceiling. Everyone is in everyone else's shoes, which not everyone does, but I did. I tried to sing about these things that could be seen as negative in a way that's balanced by an uplifting feeling through the groove and melody, especially at the end when St. Vincent and I do a lot of screaming and singing together. Music can do that - balance opposites at the same time. I realized that when I sang with Robyn earlier this year. Her songs are often sad, but the music is happy.”

“It took me a second to realize, oh yeah, these songs are personal, but with David's unique perspective on life in general,” adds Kid Harpoon (aka Tom Hull). “When I was walking around New York listening to the Everybody Laughs demo, I was so happy because it made me feel like we're all the same - we all laugh, cry and sing. The thing a lot of people like about David is that he gets the joke. He understands the absurdity of it all, and all these personal observations are his take on things.” Byrne will also be touring with a brand new live show in support of Who Is the Sky? The touring band will consist of 13 musicians, singers and dancers, including members of the American Utopia Band, all of whom will be mobile during the set. The North American tour will begin in September, with dates in Australia and New Zealand starting in January 2026 and dates in Europe and the UK the following month. In 2023, as his triumphant American Utopia era came to a close, having evolved from an album and tour to an acclaimed Broadway show and then an HBO movie directed by Spike Lee, Byrne began to jot down the occasional groove, chord or melody. It had only been a minute. During the tumultuous three years before that, “I cooked a lot (mostly Mexican and Indian) and drew a lot,” says Byrne, who also began collecting text ideas and phrases for possible songs. “I found that it's easier to get started if you have a small stockpile - and that was soon the case. Very rudimentary songs were created, with just me singing on the acoustic guitar over a programmed loop or beat.”

And while the world and the ongoing Broadway production of American Utopia took a break, he, like much of humanity, took the opportunity to ask himself, “Do I like what I'm doing? Why am I writing songs or working this job or whatever? Does any of this matter?” Byrne's attempts to answer these weighty questions are echoed on Who Is The Sky?, which builds on the optimistic themes of American Utopia and its accompanying tour, and in particular the Grammy-winning Broadway show and subsequent movie. With this work, Byrne continues his lifelong exploration of human connection and the potential for social unity against the chaotic backdrop of the world. Who Is the Sky? is particularly cinematic, humorous and joyful, but often laced with a lesson - that love is inexplicable, that enlightenment means very different things to different people, and that it's always a good idea to hydrate, whether you wake up the next morning with skin like a baby or not. Above all, however, the songs are testament to Byrne's gift for riding the razor's edge between avant-garde and accessible pop. Byrne was inspired to hire the Ghost Train Orchestra for the album after hearing their 2023 tribute album to blind New York composer and street poet Moondog, and jumped on stage with the group at a gig in Brooklyn later that year. He was fascinated by the varied instrumental line-up of the 15-piece Ghost Train Orchestra, which includes drums, percussion, guitar and bass as well as strings, winds and brass, and thought to himself, “What would it be like if my new songs sounded exactly like that?” Byrne asked if they wanted to act as his band for the “Who Is The Sky” sessions, and they quickly said yes. “David sent me some demos and asked us to put together some orchestral ideas,” says Ghost Train Orchestra leader Brian Carpenter. “Curtis Hasselbring and I quickly wrote a few rough arrangements of his songs for Ghost Train, including 'My Apartment Is My Friend,' which was the first song we rehearsed in our tiny Chinatown rehearsal space. Hearing him sing with us on that song for the first time was just incredible.”
 

Introduced at a party by a friend, Kid Harpoon came into the picture next. “Sometimes things happen at parties,” notes Byrne. “I knew it could get complicated, and I also wanted to make sure the recordings sounded as good as possible. Having some outside ears can be very helpful. A couple of artists I knew had worked with Kid Harpoon, and I thought those recordings sounded really good.” Byrne sent Harpoon some demos, and after a conversation at the hotel in Santa Monica, he was on board. On Who Is the Sky? there are “more story songs than usual”, according to Byrne. These “mini-narratives based on personal experiences” include “She Explains Things to Me” (sample lyrics: “how come it's all so obvious to her? “), “A Door Called No” (which magically opens after Byrne receives a kiss), “My Apartment Is My Friend” (“you've seen me at my very worst / but we always get along,” he sings) and “I Met the Buddha at a Downtown Party” (in which the former spiritual guru is more interested in the unhealthy deserts than deification). The joyous “What Is the Reason for It?”, characterized by the inviting vocal interplay between Byrne and Paramore's Williams, attempts to codify love in a way that logic can rarely achieve ("does it do something useful? / nobody understands it“), while ‘The Avant Garde’ wrestles with the merits of art for art's sake (”it's ahead of the curve / it's deceptively weighty, profound, absurd / it's whatever fits” - a meta-observation if ever there was one, from one of the most iconoclastic artists to emerge from the New York rock underground.

“I had a suspicion that intimate orchestral arrangements would bring out the emotion I feel in these songs,” says Byrne. “That's something people don't always hear in my work, but this time I was sure it was there. But at the same time, I see myself as someone who wants to be accessible. I envisioned Kid Harpoon helping me with that, but also being a trustworthy ear, because there was a lot to do. People think of producers mainly as people who make sure a record sounds good, and Kid Harpoon did that, but he was also aware of the importance of storytelling.” Byrne, admittedly a “stickler for grooves”, welcomed the late contributions of Skinner and Refosco, with whom he has been recording and touring for over 30 years. Mixed by Mark “Spike” Stent and mastered by Emily Lazar, the finished product is as much about hiding as it is about revealing, or as Byrne puts it, “a chance to be the mythical being we all carry within us. A chance to step into a different reality. A chance to grow beyond ourselves and escape from the prison of our 'self'”. These concepts are also reflected in the packaging of the album Who Is The Sky?, designed by Shira Inbar, in which Byrne is almost obscured by bright, colorful patterns and psychedelic, spiky outfits by Belgian artist Tom Van Der Borght.

“At my age, at least for me, there's an attitude that says I don't give a shit what people think,” says Byrne. “I can step out of my comfort zone knowing that I now know who I am and what I do. Still, every new set of songs, even every song, is a new adventure. I've found that not every collaboration works, but when it does, it's because I'm able to clearly communicate what I'm trying to do. Hopefully they understand that, and so now we're on our way to the same unknown place together.”