Commencing with Houston’s solo vocal, the chilled out track soon gains some gliding momentum with the introduction of thudding percussion and wide open, shimmering ambient soundscapes, a musical trait that Odesza have perfected over the course of their career.

Speaking on the new track, according to a press release, Odesza stated: “What we like about ‘Wide Awake’ is it feels like it encapsulates a lot of things we enjoy into one track: lots of percussive elements wrapped in emotive chords, with swirling distorted synths and leads, all centered around Charlie’s incredible vocal. It’s one of our favourites from the record and something we come back to a lot.”

The forthcoming album The Last Goodbye is set to be the duo’s most ambitious album to date. A project rife with brightness and emotion, it serves as a sweeping sonic experience that speaks to themes of connection, reminiscence, and the impact we have on one another.

Pre-release tracks showcase the depth of the album, with the title track ‘The Last Goodbye’ (feat. Bettye LaVette) being praised by the New York Times who said it “brings some Slavic melancholy to four-on-the-floor dance music” while other songs ‘Love Letter’ (feat. The Knocks) features a dynamic, emotive vocal refrain that serves as a personal proclamation, speeding amongst curtains of orchestral synths. The mesmerising ‘Behind The Sun’ includes a beautiful vocal sample from Iranian singer Simin Ghanem’s ‘Seeb’, and ‘Better Now’ (feat. MARO) features delicately balanced ambient soundscapes and instrumentation.

In other news regarding Odesza, the band will be partnering with environmental nonprofit and music industry veterans REVERB to make their tour more environmentally sustainable and to engage fans to take action for people and the planet. Not only will the tour be carbon negative, eliminating substantially more greenhouse gas pollution than the tour creates, there will also be activations at each show to encourage fans to get involved to take action against climate change.

“Behind the Sun” is a powerful track, driven by pronounced percussive thunder cracks that are somewhat reminiscent of the drumline that ODESZA utilised on their “A Moment Apart” tour. The song also makes use of a rousing vocal sample from Iranian singer Simin Ghanem’s song “Seeb”.

Speaking of the song, according to a recent press release, ODESZA said:“While digging through old records we came across a song by the legendary Iranian singer, Simin Ghanem. It was such a beautifully haunting vocal that we couldn’t really get it out of our heads. Slowly we started to build these symphonic elements around her and piece by piece it started to become this big anthemic track. We wanted to incorporate pieces of live drumming in a new way and ended up running various snare drum elements through a resonator and modulating them to each hit. Overall we really love how this song came together, bringing the past into the present is something we find really exciting and inspiring.”

The release of the new tune follows some significant milestones for the Bellingham duo, which consists of Harrison Mills and Clayton Knight. including the recent announcement of their forthcoming ‘The Last Goodbye’ amphitheatre tour (which sold over 350k tickets during the initial 72-hour on-sale period, and has now nearly sold out completely), their recent sound design & curation of the HP Antarctic Dome at this year’s Coachella and their track “Love Letter (feat. The Knocks)” trending on TikTok.

“Love Letter (feat. The Knocks)” dropped earlier this year, along with album sister tracks “The Last Goodbye (feat. Bettye LaVette)” and “Better Now (feat. MARO)”. Billboard offered warm praise of“The Last Goodbye (feat. Bettye LaVette)”, calling it “a sleek, propulsive stunner” while the NY Times said it “brings some Slavic melancholy to four-on-the-floor dance music, samples the most heart-rending phrases of LaVette’s vocals and stretches out the anguish, proving again how classic the song remains”.

A recent press release said of Odesza’s highly anticipated new record: “The upcoming album is set to be the duo’s most ambitious album to date. A project rife with brightness and emotion, nostalgic yet rooted in the present, it serves as a sweeping sonic experience that speaks to themes of connection, reminiscence, and the impact we impart on one another.”

On the forthcoming “The Last Goodbye” tour, ODESZA will be performing a brand-new set and visuals on their biggest headlining tour to date. The duo will be embarking on an amphitheatre run featuring special guests Sylvan Esso, as well as additional support from the likes of San Holo, Elderbrook, Ben Böhmer and Foreign Family Collective acts: ford., Gilligan Moss, & NASAYA. Details on full dates and support notation can be found here.

The ethereal, feverish visuals were directed by Vladimiro Leopoldo, who expertly instils a fever-dream feeling in the viewer, fusing together psychedelic performance shots of Maro with serene, calming moments . You can view the stunning video at the link below.

“Better Now” features a perfect collision of Odesza’s expertly produced ambient soundscapes and ethereal beats and Portuguese singer Maro’s dynamic, expressive vocals. Odesza have long been a group who work closely with other artists to add new sonic and stylistic dimensions to their music, and that is no different in this gorgeous track.

Odesza’s highly anticipated new album The Last Goodbye drops July 22nd, and will be followed by a massive nationwide tour of the United States, that, excitingly, marks one of the first amphitheater runs ever for an electronic artist.

To the delight of fans, Odesza returned in February with their first non-collaborative music release since 2017, “The Last Goodbye”, a song that straddles the line between ethereal and danceable, featuring a soaring vocal sample from soul singer Bettye LaVette. Following the release of the second single “Better Now”, the group announced their new album The Last Goodbye would be released on July 22^nd via Foreign Family Collective and Ninja Tune, and shared their third single “Love Letter”.

In addition to Bettye LaVette and Maro, The Last Goodbye will feature a myriad different artists, including Ólafur Arnolds, Julianna Barwick, Izzy Bizu and Charlie Houston.

The group said of the forthcoming album in a press statement: “Over the past few years we’ve been able to reflect on who we are, what it means to do what we do, and in the end, who we are doing this for. We became focused and inspired by the impact our families and friends have imprinted on us and how we want to continue to echo that out as we move through this life. We found comfort in the fact that those who we love stay with us, that they become intrinsically part of us, in a way.  Is there ever a really a Last Goodbye? We don’t think there is. So, from us to you. The Last Goodbye, the album.”

You can pre-order The Last Goodbye here, and you can find tour information at this link.

Symphonic, vast, and emotionally stirring, ‘The Last Goodbye’ is the duo’s most ambitious album to date. Nostalgic yet rooted in the present, it serves as a sweeping sonic experience that speaks to themes of connection and reminiscence. Interwoven with both the new and the old, the album is interspersed with personal audio clips from home video footage, hypnotherapy sessions and even the voices of the duo’s parents, plus features The Knocks, Bettye LaVette, MARO, Låpsley, Ólafur Arnalds, Julianna Barwick, Izzy Bizu and Charlie Houston. These collaborations follow previous high-profile musical partnerships with the likes of Leon Bridges, Little Dragon, Regina Spektor, RY X, Naomi Wild, and more.

Is there ever a really a Last Goodbye? We don’t think there is.

So, from us to you. The Last Goodbye, the Album. Out July 22nd. Available for pre-order now. Love Letter feat. @theknocks, our next single is out now ✨https://t.co/vgq4pYHLYg pic.twitter.com/RRTTJo3jSx

— ODESZA (@odesza) March 23, 2022

Discussing the album, Odesza say: “Over the past few years we’ve been able to reflect on who we are, what it means to do what we do, and in the end, who we are doing this for. We became focused and inspired by the impact our families and friends have imprinted on us and how we want to continue to echo that out as we move through this life. We found comfort in the fact that those who we love stay with us, that they become intrinsically part of us, in a way.  Is there ever a really a Last Goodbye? We don’t think there is. So, from us to you. The Last Goodbye, the album.”

New single “Love Letter (feat. The Knocks)”, is also released today. Featuring a dynamic, emotive vocal refrain and orchestral synths, the track joins previous singles “The Last Goodbye” (feat. Bettye LaVette), celebrated as, “a sleek, propulsive stunner” by Billboard and “powerful” by Wonderland, and “Better Now” (feat. MARO), deemed an “uplifting track ready for spring” by Notion. The singles have achieved a combined 13 million streams globally to date, plus widespread radio support from the likes of Apple Music 1’s Zane Lowe, BBC Radio 1’s Pete Tong, Danny Howard and Sian Eleri, plus KISS Dance and Capital Dance.

Discussing collaborating with Odesza on “Love Letter”, The Knocks say, “This song has had a wild ride!  It was originally started about 5 years ago and went through many versions before ODESZA took it to its final form. We always knew there was something really special about it.  It was one of those ideas we kept coming back to and being frustrated by because we knew it was amazing but we couldn’t get it totally right.  

Cut to us meeting the ODESZA guys backstage at a festival after both being fans of each other and eventually chatted about doing a song together. We started sharing original ideas back and forth. They loved “Love Letter” and were going to work on it remotely.  A year or so passed when we reconnected and they said they weren’t sure they figured it out… so we were back to the drawing board. Then one day, we got a text from the guys out of the blue saying they had cracked it!  This new version blew our minds and we felt like it had finally found its rightful home. The rest is history.”

Photo credit: Alexander Babarikin

The video is directed by Sean Kusanagi, and depicts Odesza performing in a moody, darkened room. The clear focal point of the video is the instrumentation in the music; Odesza’s Clayton Knight and Harrison Mills are seen playing synthesisers and guitars, and are also joined by Eva Walker and Garret Hopper on bass and drums respectively. The visually stunning, cinematic video also features archival footage of Bettye LaVette performing “Let Me Down Easy”, the song from which the soaring, emotive vocal line is sampled from.

“The Last Goodbye” marks an impressive return for Odesza, having accumulated over four million streams on worldwide streaming platforms in just a week. The song strikes a delightful balance between ethereal, thoughtful soundscapes and pulsing, danceable beats throughout. The song commences with a soft, breathy synthesiser and piano that gently tiptoes in the background, as Bettye LaVette’s soulful voice croons out; “Let me down easy, though your love for me is gone”, before breaking into a feverish, rippling beat drop as the LaVette can be heard belting over the top. This hypnotic, driving beat is complimented by a grooving, overdriven bass guitar part that enters around the halfway point, which provides a real earworm in place of the vocal sample.

According to Pitchfork, Odesza said of the recently released song: “This song was born out of the concept of trying to bring these lasting, defining musical pieces like the 1965 release of ‘Let Me Down Easy’ by Bettye LaVette into a modern and contemporary electronic setting…The idea of bringing two worlds together, that at first seem distant, has always been something we’ve been drawn to. It was an absolute honor to be able to work with Bettye’s voice over the course of writing the track. She’s able to convey emotion with her vocal work unlike any other. To date, this has been one of the more fulfilling songs we’ve had the chance to work on as artists. We hope everyone who listens enjoys the track as much as we did making it.”

Odesza’s last sole release as a duo was 2017’s A Moment Apart, an album that saw Knight and Mills collaborating with a number of different artists such as singer Regina Spektor and soul singer-songwriter Leon Bridges, to name just two. In 2020, the group released an album with Australian producer Golden Features, entitled Bronson, although this was an entirely collaborative effort, with creative duties shared throughout the record. You can find Odesza’s musical catalogue on all available streaming services, and links to their music and various socials are available via the duo’s website.

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“The Last Goodbye” features the stunning vocal talents of American soul singer Bettye LaVette; in particular, a sample of “Let Me Down Easy”, showcasing her soaring voice and poignant lyrics paired with crisp, feverish synthesiser pads. The song strikes a balance between thoughtful placidity and being undeniably hypnotic and danceable, a factor aided by the inclusion of pumping beats and a grooving, lightly overdriven bassline that kicks in at the halfway mark, launching the tune from a hazy soundscape into a trancelike storm, punctuated by the thunder crack of the bass guitar. The Bellingham duo have also released a visualiser for the tune, which can be viewed down below.

According to Pitchfork, Odesza said of the song: “This song was born out of the concept of trying to bring these lasting, defining musical pieces like the 1965 release of ‘Let Me Down Easy’ by Bettye LaVette into a modern and contemporary electronic setting…The idea of bringing two worlds together, that at first seem distant, has always been something we’ve been drawn to. It was an absolute honor to be able to work with Bettye’s voice over the course of writing the track. She’s able to convey emotion with her vocal work unlike any other. To date, this has been one of the more fulfilling songs we’ve had the chance to work on as artists. We hope everyone who listens enjoys the track as much as we did making it.”

The duo’s last album A Moment Apart was released in 2017, and featured a host of different artists, such as singer Regina Spektor and soul singer-songwriter Leon Bridges. The album received reasonable reviews from critics, with Exclaim! saying of the record: “both sides complement one another and make for a fully realized album filled with beautiful soundscapes and dreamy vocals.” Sonically, whilst the record most certainly featured the wide, lush sound world that Odesza are perhaps known for, the features often determined the overall stylistic vibe in places; Bridges’ feature in “Across The Room” drives the song in a more soul-like direction, and Sasha Alex Sloan’s feature on “Falls” carries more than a hint of 2010s radio pop, featuring a dance drop with pitched-up vocals. You can listen to A Moment Apart, in addition to the rest of Odesza’s musical catalogue on all streaming services.

In 2020, the group released Bronson, a collaborative album with Australian producer Golden Features. Unlike A Moment Apart, this was a purely collaborative work between Odesza and Golden Features as Bronson, with the addition of featured vocalists such as lau.ra and Gallant.