Bonnie “Prince” Billy (Will Oldham) confirmed a new album, Keeping Secrets Will Destroy You, due out August 11 via Drag City. Oldham previewed the first Bonnie “Prince” Billy album since 2019 with the single/video “Bananas.”
Keeping Secrets Will Destroy You (KSWDY) is the first solo Bonnie “Prince” Billy album since 2019’s I Made a Place. Bonnie “Prince Billy did participate in a pair of collaborative albums — Superwolves with Matt Sweeney and Blind Date Party with Bill Callahan — in 2021.
KSWDY saw Oldham recording in his hometown of Louisville, Kentucky with Nick Roeder. Contributors on the record include violinist Sara Louise Callaway, keyboardist Kendall Carter, violinist/violist Elisabeth Fuchsia, mandolinist Dave Howard, saxophonist Drew Miller and vocalist Dane Waters.
“The presence of so many local players and music educators in the band lends not only to a flow of moments so fluidly encompassing of a wide range of musics from classical to Japanese acid folk and elsewhere,” as per a press release for KSWDY, “but perhaps even more importantly, to the sense of community, heredity and the triumph of inheritance that is the marrow and life blood of this music.”
KSWDY lead single “Bananas” arrived along with a music video by Ethan Osman, who created the visual without heraing the song but rather by interpreting prompts from Bonnie “Prince” Billy. Watch below:
