Arlo Parks – “Blades”

Alexandra Waespi

Arlo Parks – “Blades”

Alexandra Waespi

We’re about a month away from the release of My Soft Machine, Arlo Parks’ big follow-up to her Mercury Prize-winning debut Collapsed In Sunbeams. We’ve posted the early singles “Weightless” and “Impurities,” and now Parks has dropped the new song “Blades,” a smooth dance-pop track that she recorded with Adele/Florence And The Machine producer Paul Epworth.

“Blades” rides a hazy synth-beat, and it’s got Arlo Parks adapting an understated swagger to sing about rebuilding a friendship. In the bedroom-directed video, Parks rides on the back of a motorcycle and beholds a wall of psychedelic LED lights. In a press release, Parks says:

Paul is just a wizard; he has this childlike spirit that I’ve always really loved and he brought that to “Blades.” I wanted to make something that I can dance to, finally, because I feel like my songs don’t really have that quality in general. So, I took inspiration from bands like ESG, artists like Kaytranada, and a lot of the kind of ’70s Zambian psychedelic rock that I love.

Watch the “Blades” video below.

My Soft Machine is out 5/26 on Transgressive.

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