Before will serve as the climax to the string of brilliant singles that Blake has shared recently. Blake dropped a cover of Frank Ocean’s Godspeed on September 11th, before working with Mount Kimbie and slowthai for collaborative track feel away, that premiered on September 15th. 

Earlier this week, Blake indicated at a new project through some heavy hinting on social media. Taking to Instagram, Blake posted a story with two telephone numbers, one for the UK and one for the USA.

When excited Blake fans call either number in the artist’s bio, they will be directed to a timer on the official James Blake website, counting down to October 14th. The Before EP will be Blake’s first full-length project since Assume Form, the twelve track album that Blake released back in January of 2019. 

Music broadcaster Boiler Room confirmed the EP release date as October 13th by sharing a post of the Before promotional poster to Twitter. The exciting post can be viewed here.

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I love working with Starrah. She’s a dream. After ‘Are You Even Real’ we stayed on a roll and this one came along soon after. Couldn’t be happier to have a production with her, with help from my man @dom_maker – this one she absolutely killed. I know she’s known for her great melodies, but the lyrics on this one are‘Complex, convex, can tell you love to project’…@whereisstarrah @dom_maker

A post shared by James Blake (@jamesblake) on Sep 23, 2020 at 11:12am PDT

Blake, who is widely known for his genre-defying music, has said that he has at times struggled to write music since attaining success. In an interview with NME, the multiinstrumentalist spoke on his plans for future releases: “I’m embracing more of the experimental side of myself, different time signatures and being a bit more fluid”

Blake continued, expanding on the pressure he sometimes feels making music as a globally known artist: “if you feel pressure to create a big song, which I think is in the back of the mind of any artist who’s had a big song, unfortunately, that creates a pressure to homogenise further songs to the framework that you think will create another big song”

Recently, Blake teamed up with singer-songwriter Starrah by producing her enchanting track, Keep Calm, which came out on September 23rd. In a post to Instagram, Blake showed his appreciation for Starrah, real name Brittany Hazzard, who collaborated with Blake on Are You Even Real? 

Blake wrote affectionately “I love working with Starrah. She’s a dream. After ‘Are You Even Real’ we stayed on a roll and this one came along soon after. I couldn’t be happier to have a production with her.” Keep Calm can be listened to here.

Before is out on October 13th.