News: Normandie announce new album 'Dopamine'

Stockholm trio, Normandie, have today announced their new album, ‘Dopamine’, for a February 9th 2024 release on Easy Life Records. To mark the announcement, the band have released a brand new single, ‘Flowers For The Grave’, in-keeping with the band’s ‘Dopamine Clinic’, which sees new songs prescribed on the first of every month leading up to album release.

Speaking of ‘Flowers…’, frontman Philip Strand says, “Flowers For The Grave is a song about not saving the best for last. Live your life on the daily and appreciate things taking their time! We’re taught to chase our dreams, but chasing something in the future means you might miss the moment.”

Set in a not-too-distant and – crucially – not-at-all-unrealistic future, Normandie’s fourth album, ‘Dopamine’, finds the band asking two unsettling questions: what if we pushed our brains and bodies far beyond their limits?

And what if we already are?

On their follow-up to 2021’s ‘Dark & Beautiful Secrets’, Philip, Håkan (Almbladh – guitar) and Anton (Franzon – drums) tackle the overstimulation of modern life head-on, and answer some hefty questions with some even bigger songs to produce a devastating, clinical example of everything a modern rock band should be.

“The whole album is about the chase for different highs and natural chemicals: oxytocin, serotonin, dopamine, endorphins, adrenaline…” starts Philip.

“What if dopamine had to be clinically provided because we’ve burned through our receptors?”

“Making this album futuristic and dystopian came very naturally when we started discussing the current state of the world. We’re all on overdrive. We’re upping the stakes all the time, and everybody has a higher tolerance now for stress in a way that nobody saw coming,” he explains.

“Back in the old days you were sowing potatoes and that was your one goal for the day – we were hunter-gatherers and we were just there to provide for our families. Today, we have so many things going on. We’re taught to chase our dreams, but chasing something in the future means you might miss the moment.”

‘Dopamine’ chronicles a different type of disorder to the band’s previous album, which took a deep, dark dive into Philip’ religious upbringing and its aftereffects. This time around, the band looked around at their present, and imagined what a fictional, hellish future might look like, rather than dwelling on the past.

In this future, swathes of society have burned out their neurotransmitters and have to take their dopamine in the same way we do today with caffeine, like that hit of morning coffee that makes you feel human again. But this time, dopamine isn’t used as a stimulant. It’s just what we take to get through the day.

What makes ‘Dopamine’ feel even more vital is that it’s a futuristic, dynamic rock album that even with everything *gestures wildly* happening within, is clearly made by actual people, with all of their humanity and contradictions laid bare.

Welcome to the Dopamine Clinic. ☺

‘Dopamine’

TRACKLISTING

1. Overdrive

2. Serotonin

3. Flowers In The Grave

4. Blood In The Water

5. Ritual

6. Butterflies

7. Colorblind

8. Hourglass (feat. Dani Winter-Bates of Bury Tomorrow)

9. Sorry

10. All In My Head

11. Glue

Also announced today is the band’s Dopamine headline tour of Europe, including two UK dates in Manchester and London next March. Fans who pre-order the album this weekend can gain early access to tickets, ahead of their general on-sale on Wednesday (Sep 6th) morning.

THE DOPAMINE TOUR: EUROPE

FEBRUARY

10: PARIS La Maroquinerie

11: FRANKFURT Batschkapp

13: COLOGNE Die Kantine

14: HAARLEM Patronaat

15: HAMBURG Uebel & Gefährlich

16: COPENHAGEN Pumpehuset

MARCH

13: MANCHESTER Academy 2

14: LONDON Electric Ballroom

16: MUNICH Technikum