Deerhunter's latest single, from the just-announced album Why Hasn't Everything Already Disappeared?, finds frontman Bradford Cox questioning the point of anything in a world turned upside down. "Your friends have died and their lives just fade away," Cox sings on "Death In Midsummer," over an almost jaunty harpsichord theme. "Some worked the hills, some worked the factories, worked their lives away, and in time you will see your own life fade away."
While it's an admittedly bleak acknowledgement of the inevitable, Cox draws no real conclusions. In a beautifully shot video for the track, he instead keeps searching for a way to make sense of the senseless, kicking around dusty backroads and an abandoned home in the middle of nowhere, looking for direction. While "Death In Midsummer" lacks some of the sonic adventure of Deerhunter's earlier work, it signals a period of deep introspection informed by the political and cultural disruptions of recent years.
Why Hasn't Everything Already Disappeared? comes out Jan. 18 on 4AD. It was produced by Cate LeBon, Ben H. Allen III, Ben Etter, and Deerhunter.
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