SlipLive

Gather 'round the dinner table, kids, 'cause it's time for a little Akron/Family meeting, and there's news to share! The band has just announced that they're preparing a new album, titled Meek Warrior, on Young God this September. Recorded primarily at Chicago's Shappe Shoppe, the forthcoming LP was produced by Akron/Family and Michael Gira, and engineered by Griffin Rodriguez (Need New Body, Icy Demons, Bablicon), who also plays bass on one song, "No Space in This Realm". The band also spent a day recording in Toronto with their bros from Do Make Say Think/Broken Social Scene.

The album will feature songs mostly written on the road, "in the van the few weeks prior to the studio time, while we were all freezing in the wintery hinderlands of middle Canada, wheezing with bronchitis," according to Family man Seth Olinsky.

The Chicago location presented Akron/Family with the unique opportunity to collaborate with legendary free jazz percussionist Hamid Drake. Drake, said Olinsky, was "a total dream and pleasure" to work with in the studio, as he helped "bring the music to life." Charles Waters of the Gold Sparkle Band and William Parker's Little Huey Creative Orchestra also contributed saxophone and clarinet solos to the album.

The band aims to hold a record release party at the end of September at Tonic in New York City, followed by an appearance at the Pop Montreal Festival in, uh, Montreal, as well as a few other dates in Canada. A West Coast tour is on the agenda for December, as is the recording of yet another new album in October in November. As they say, the family that plays together, stays together.