Olly Alexander Releases New Album 'Polari'

Olly Alexander has just released his first album under his own name. Polari is Alexander's full disclosure on who he is as an artist; an explorative musical showcase to the world in this moment in time, over a decade into his prolific career as a singer, songwriter, actor and activist - Olly is fast becoming an iconic cultural figure of our times.

Alongside the album release, is an official music video for "Whisper In The Waves," directed by Colin Solal Cardo, completing a run of aesthetically arresting videos from the acclaimed director. Watch the official music video for "Whisper In The Waves" HERE.

Polari, and the album's title track, open with a strident blast of kinetic pop energy and continues with timeless pop songs throughout. "Recently, I have had this thing where I'm thinking, is this what my creative life should've been all along?" says Olly, on the precipice of sharing Polari. "I'm putting out music I love, on my terms, that means something to me."

Made entirely in universally regarded pop producer, Danny L. Harle's humble top-floor studios on Hackney Road, right across the road from where Olly's first misadventures in the East End gay club scene took place, Polari is a luminous baton passed from one era of riveting queer pop history to another. "I was really trying to find what feels like my identity now," he reveals. "It all started to make sense as soon as I started making a record there." He would regale stories of nights gone by to Danny, then they would reimagine them from a myriad of sounds nodding to gay clubs past, present, future.

The first song they alighted on was also the first single released from the album, "Cupid's Bow," a rigorous, dreamlike disco reverie on cruising. The lyric nodding to the same Cupid George Michael sees nothing in the eyes of on "Fastlove," the god of attraction, desire and erotic love. They discovered a mutual obsession with the pop soundscapes that dominated the 1980s but were set on channeling new ways to expose a modern listener to the joy and escapism that music offered across that pivotal decade.

The songs thereafter came easily as they tapped into one others' pop psyche. Each song started to sound like a hit beamed in from another era, then lent the fairy dust of living in the here and now. The melancholic chug of "Archangel" (deemed by ELLE Magazine as a "standout" on the album, with Billboard lauding it as a "Critic's Pick") bled into the vigor and slam of current single "When We Kiss."

The album makes a tender pitstop for, "Whisper In The Waves" and the soft electronic tones of "Beautiful" before cranking right back up a gear with "Heal You" and "Language." When Olly's Eurovision song, "Dizzy," appears with its full Pet Shop Boys' pomp-indebted introduction midway through Polari, it suddenly all makes sense. By the time they got to producing "Make Me a Man," they were so confident of the passing of time between their inspiration and what was happening in the studio, Olly and Danny approached Depeche Mode, Erasure and Yazoo songwriter-in-chief, Vince Clarke to produce it. "And he said yes," says Olly, delighted at the production coup. "It couldn't have worked out better."

Polari, famously, was the coded, often hilarious language shared between gay men in inter- and post-war Britain. A language that peaked before the UK's legalization of homosexuality in 1967. Eventually, Polari bled into the mainstream, lending the British vocabulary fabulous new slang like "shady," "camp," "drag," "trade" (for sex) and "slap" (for makeup). Each of which could underscore moments of Olly Alexander's debut solo album, of sorts. Polari the record is a full investigation of his private thoughts, dressed up as a magnetic succession of anthems for public display. "Just the fact of being gay and having a secret language. That felt like it spoke to me as an artist. That's what my whole life has been. So, it became the thing that defined the best record I've ever made."

Olly Alexander will head out on his Up Close and Polari Tour this spring, playing across the UK and Europe.

ABOUT OLLY ALEXANDER:

Entering a brand new solo era, Olly Alexander's influence on pop culture shines bright. As Years & Years, Olly scored 2 #1 UK albums, 10 UK Top 40 singles and was awarded the BRIT Billion Award with 6.5 billion streams globally. He was nominated for Leading Actor at the 2022 BAFTA Television Awards for his role in the hit show 'It's A Sin', which brought the fight against HIV/Aids back into public conversation and challenged perceptions of queer life for good. In 2024 Olly fulfilled a childhood fantasy of representing the UK in the Eurovision Song Contest, flying the flag as only he could in the first preview of Polari, 'Dizzy'.

He also returned to the stage this month with a role in the internationally-acclaimed experimental drama 'White Rabbit Red Rabbit', following a rotating cast that includes the likes of Michael Sheen, Minnie Driver and Daisy Edgar-Jones. Having headlined arenas and festivals worldwide - not to mention collaborating with Elton John, Kylie and Pet Shop Boys - it's an icon-status that even saw him immortalized at Madame Tussauds London. Polari, the album, is set for release in February 2025.

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