For Those I Love, the brainchild of Dublin producer, visual artist and songwriter David Balfe, announces their second album, Carving The Stone, is set for release on 8 August via September Recordings. In support of the album, For Those I Love will tour Ireland for the first time and perform their biggest UK tour yet.
Tickets for the tour will go on general sale on Friday 4 July at 10am.
Pre-sale access will be available from Tuesday 2 July at 10am.
Following For Those I Love’s acclaimed return last month with ‘Of The Sorrows’, his first new material since 2021, he also shares a second single from the record, a sequel of sorts to a highlight from the debut, in the form of ‘No Scheme’.
On ‘No Scheme’, Balfe contrasts the aliveness, hedonism and self-destructiveness of his teenage years to the numbness of adult working life (“We’ve all got real jobs and we’re bored“). Few things expose the harsh ticking of time more than monotonous office jobs. He even calls, tongue in cheek, for the seizure of the “means of chronic boredom from the bourgeoisie“.
‘No Scheme’ faces head on the mundanity of your early thirties when you’ve sold your soul. He is torn between a desire for stability and an undeniable lust for danger. But here, as elsewhere on the record, Balfe embraces the hypocrises of modern life, even calling himself a “class traitor“. We are all compromised, especially if we don’t fight back like the “Ma’s on the frontlines of the boycotts“, but we can make some kind of peace in moral ambiguity. He had the following to say about the themes of his new single:
“No Scheme is the spiritual successor to Top Scheme, the only track on the new album with a direct link to the old. Anchored by the same chaos as Top Scheme, No Scheme trades some of its anger for despondency, it’s rage for reflection, while never fully leaving that original fire behind. Like much of the album it comes from, whenever it points the finger outwardly, it points it back inwardly too. Hypocrisy, complacency, and culpability are all present, but so too is a search for justice or meaning in an increasingly confusing time. A great deal has changed since I wrote it, but I feel as committed as ever to sharing it with you all.”
For Those I Love Live Dates
September
23 – The Fleece, Bristol
25 – Islington Assembly Hall, London
28 – Gorilla, Manchester
29 – Room 2, Glasgow
October
1 – Limelight 2, Belfast
2 – Cyprus Ave, Cork
3 – Mike The Pies, Listowel
5 – Black Box, Galway
6 – 3Olympia Theatre, Dublin
For more information on For Those I Love please check their website and instagram.
