Bonobo announced Fragment, a new album to be released on January 14, 2022 (Ninja Tune), accompanied by a 2022 world tour. Fragments is the most emotionally intense record he – aka Simon Green – has ever had to make. It is not surprising that this is also his masterpiece. The album features Jamila Woods, Joji, Kadhja Bonet, Jordan Rakei, O’Flynn and Miguel Atwood-Ferguson. Born first out of fragments of ideas and experimentation, the album was eventually merged into a burst of creativity fueled both by collaboration and Green’s escape into nature.

One of the biggest names in dance music, Green’s career includes 3 Grammy nominations and performs in front of over 2 million people on the tour supporting his 2017 album Migration. Migration also reached No. 1 on Billboard’s Dance Albums chart and reached the top ten in several countries. He is also one of the most beloved artists on the main stage of the biggest music festivals in the world.

Along with today’s announcement, Bonobo shared “Rosewood,” which debuted on Zane Lowe’s Apple Music program earlier today.

Listen to “Rosewood” and watch the visualizer here:

https://bonobo.lnk.to/fragmentsPR

https://bonobo.lnk.to/fragmentsPR/youtube

The artwork for Fragments and the visualizer for “Rosewood” were both created by Neil Krug, who returns after making the artwork for the 2017 migration.

Fragments is a series of 12 sound affirmations, featuring some of the hardest and most exciting grooves Green has ever created. The ballads are perfectly placed everywhere; they capture a world in motion and radiate hope. Cuddling ideas first took hard work. The Constantly Touring Green creates the best on the go; the global shutdown forced him to stand still.

Musical themes began to emerge through Green’s exploration of modular synthesis, his recordings of harpist Lara Somogyi, his work with arranger and string player Miguel Atwood-Ferguson, his own. playing the Fender Rhodes and more, as the album was made, recorded and mixed by Green over the past two years. The album also focused as it sought refuge in solo adventures in nature, away from closures and wildfires, and in the scorching desert of California.

“Tides,” starring Chicago singer and poet Jamila Woods, acted as a catalyst, and the album began to fall into place around him. “I knew I had a centerpiece, I knew how it was all going to sound,” he says. While working with Miguel Atwood-Ferguson, musical themes began to emerge. Recording orchestral musicians in real studios helped make the songs even more “out of the box”.

A rhythmic framework also began to form: structures of British bass music and rave began to seep into rhythms that would become tracks like “Otomo” (possibly co-produced by O’Flynn and featuring a sample of the Bulgarian choir 100 Kaba- Gaidi) and “Sapien”. The “old school, Detroity, Moodymann and Theo Parrish inspired” “Shadows” was recorded with friend Jordan Rakei. “Rosewood”, “Closer” and “Counterpart” each begin with an ecstatic wink, but take surprisingly different paths. Somogyi’s harp and Atwood-Ferguson strings mingle on the rhythmless “Elysian”. Two ballads fill out the second half of the record: “Day by Day” with Kadhja Bonet and “From You” with Joji.

FRAGMENTS LIVE TOUR DATES – 2022

North America
February 18: Wildhorse Saloon, Nashville, Tennessee
February 19: PromoWest Pavilion at Ovation, Newport, KY
February 20: EXPRESS LIVE !, Columbus, OH
21-Feb: AE Internship, Pittsburgh, PA
25-Feb: Great Hall, Brooklyn, NY
27-Feb: Royale, Boston, MA
28-Feb: Echostage, Washington, DC
02-March: Franklin Music Hall, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
05-March: Higher Ground, Burlington, Vermont
06-March: Mtelus, Montreal, QC
March 09: History, Toronto, ON
March 10: Royal Oak Music Hall, Royal Oak, MI
March 11: Byline Bank Aragon Ballroom, Chicago, IL
March 12: The Sylvee, Madison, WI
March 13: Turner Hall, Milwaukee, WI
March 15: The Palace, Minneapolis, MN
March 17: Mission Ballroom, Denver, CO
March 18: The Complex, Salt Lake City, UT
March 19: Knitting Factory, Boise, ID
March 21: PNE Forum, Vancouver, BC
March 22: Showbox SoDo, Seattle, WA
March 24: Roseland Theater, Portland, OR

Europe
April 20: AFAS Live, Amsterdam, Netherlands
April 21: edel-optics.de Arena, Hamburg, DE
23-Apr: UFO im Velodrom, Berlin, De
Apr 24: Palladium, Cologne, De
25-Apr. : TonHalle, Munich, De
26-Apr. : Xtra, Zurich, CH
28-Apr: Le Centquatre, Paris, FR

UK
03-May: The Brighton Center, Brighton, United Kingdom
04-May: O2 Academy, Birmingham, UK
06-May: Victoria Warehouse, Manchester, UK
07-May: O2 Academy, Leeds, UK
08-May: Rock City, Nottingham, UK
May 16: Royal Albert Hall, London, United Kingdom
May 17: Royal Albert Hall, London, United Kingdom
May 18: Royal Albert Hall, London, United Kingdom

It’s about the dance floor in many ways, about how “I once again remembered how much I loved crowds and movement and people connecting with each other”, se Green remembers. But positivity isn’t just in uptempo rhythms: even the most introspective and melancholy tracks rejoice in it.