It’s been … wow, almost four years since our last Broken Bells update. The collaboration between Brian Burton (aka Danger Mouse) and James Mercer (of The Shins) has lain dormant for years, but it appears that’s about to change—and soon.
The super-duo posted a cryptic teaser to their official social channels on Wednesday afternoon, consisting only of an image that would appear to be album art, and a date: June 29, precisely two weeks from today (June 15).
June 29 pic.twitter.com/1mEdfG57bI
— Broken Bells (@broken_bells) June 15, 2022
The image also now appears as the background on Broken Bells’ website. Its central textured sphere shape is reminiscent not only of the cover of their self-titled 2010 debut album, but also of the art for their 2018 and 2019 singles, “Shelter” and “Good Luck,” respectively—suggesting that this is, in fact, the duo’s third album being teased, on which those songs presumably appear.
Broken Bells first tipped their LP3 hand back in December 2018 with the release of “Shelter,” then their first new music in four years, following their 2014 album After the Disco. A couple of days later, Paste took stock of everything we knew about the album (which a press release characterized as a “work in progress”), though the answer turned out to be “not much.”
Broken Bells returned with “Good Luck” the following September, and released a video for the track in May 2020, with an accompanying press release acknowledging a continued wait for “updates on the third full-length Broken Bells album (still in the works).” That was the last we had heard from the duo until today.
Burton and Mercer have been busy: The former announced a new collaborative album with Black Thought last month, while the latter will soon embark on a tour in celebration of the 21st anniversary of The Shins’ Oh, Inverted World.
Paste has reached out to reps for Broken Bells, and will update this post if they’re able to share any further information on the teaser. In the meantime, revisit “Good Luck” and “Shelter” below.