Jens Lekman announces first new album in 8 years & tour, shares “Candy From a Stranger”

Jens Lekman has announced Songs For Other Peoples Weddings, his first new album in eight years, which will be out September 12 via Secretly Canadian. It’s a concept album about a fictional wedding singer and was inspired by his own experience as a wedding singer, which stemmed from his 2004 song “If You Ever Need a Stranger (To Sing at Your Wedding).”

There is also a companion novel of the same name that was written with author David Levithan (Nick And Norah’s Infinite Playlist), and that will be out August 5.

“The idea to make a narrative concept album (a rock opera?) felt forbidden,” Jens says. “Which, for me, is usually a sign that I’m on the right path. While investigating the genre of narrative concept albums, I realized that one of my all-time favorite albums, Frank Sinatra’s Watertown, was in fact just that– a record that told a chronological story over the length of an LP. Having never been a fan of musicals or rock operas, this album served as inspiration.”

Jens continues, “I wrote the album while the book was still being written and, at some points, I started imagining what happened between the book’s chapters. The book and the album eventually became intertwined but also found their own paths. The book provided the structure of the story, but the album sometimes snuck behind the scenes. Stories from the songs made their way into the book and vice versa.”

Here’s a little more on the album’s story: “J, an unlucky-in-love musician who moonlights as a wedding singer. J gathers with couples before their big day to learn more about the intimate, strange things that brought them together, in order to write an original song to perform for them at their wedding. But despite J’s penchant for finding the perfect words for others, he can’t seem to do the same for his own love with his girlfriend, V.” On the album, V is given voice by singer Matilda Sargren.

The first single from the album is disco-tinged “Candy from a Stranger” which Jens says “is the point in the story where the lovers meet for the first time, or do they?” You can watch the video below.

Jens has also announced a fall North American tour, which hits Brooklyn’s Music Hall of Williamsburg on November 16. Tickets will be on sale soon and all dates are listed below.

Songs For Other People’s Weddings:
1. The First Lovesong
2. A Tuxedo Sewn For Two
3. Candy From a Stranger
4. Two Little Pigs
5. Speak To Me In Music
6. With You I Can Hear My Own Voice
7. I Want To Want You Again
8. GOT-JFK
9. Wedding In Brooklyn
10. For Skye
11. Increasingly Obsolete
12. On a Pier, On the Hudson
13. Wedding In Leipzig
14. LEJ-GOT
15. You Have One New Message
16. Just For One Moment
17. The Last Lovesong

Jens Lekman Live Dates:
11/08 – Minneapolis, MN – Amsterdam Bar & Hall
11/09 – Chicago, IL – Lincoln Hall
11/10 – Toronto, ON – The Great Hall
11/12 – Boston, MA – The Sinclair
11/13 – Northampton, MA – Iron Horse
11/14 – Philadelphia, PA – Underground Arts
11/16 – Brooklyn, NY – Music Hall of Williamsburg
11/17 – Washington, D.C. – Union Stage
11/19 – Durham, NC – Motorco Music Hall
11/21 – Atlanta, GA – The EARL
11/22 – Nashville, TN – Exit/In
11/24 – Dallas, TX – Deep Ellum
11/25 – Austin, TX – Mohawk
11/28 – Phoenix, AZ – Crescent Ballroom
11/29 – Los Angeles, CA – Lodge Room
11/30 – San Francisco, CA – The Independent
12/02 – Portland, OR – Aladdin Theater
12/03 – Seattle, WA – Neumos