FIDLAR Releases New Single 'DOWN N OUT'
The song is from their upcoming album that will arrive on September 20, 2024.
By: Josh Sharpe Jul. 18, 2024
FIDLAR have released their new single “DOWN N OUT”; the SoCal trio’s latest preview of their forthcoming album SURVIVING THE DREAM.
A sunburnt surf punk track with propulsive guitars and tongue-in-cheek spoken-word banter, the song couples signature FIDLAR ingredients while grappling with the harsh realities of aging as frontman Zac Carper sings “I am old as f*ck / I’ve made better stuff / down and out on drugs / down and out in love". It’s a theme woven throughout the fabric of SURVIVING THE DREAM, the band’s long-awaited fourth studio LP and first in over five years that will arrive on September 20, 2024.
"This is a song about growing up, seeing yourself change, and not giving a f*ck,” says Zac about ‘DOWN N OUT’. "I gave up drugs to fall in love and I’ve gotta say: love is better than drugs."
Last month, the group officially announced SURVIVING THE DREAM with a red-hot double-single “GET OFF MY WAVE” and “FIX ME” – the latter of which premiered alongside a music video featuring an unhinged karaoke performance from Sosie Bacon. The comeback sparked a frenzy of attention: from coveted placements on Spotify’s All New Rock, New Noise, and Noisy playlists and New Music Daily on Apple Music, to globe-spanning coverage from Rolling Stone, Stereogum, UPROXX, Consequence, Exclaim, Kerrang!, Clash, DIY Magazine and more, with LA Times stating “[FIDLAR] have successfully crossed over from the young and rebellious kids that burst onto the scene in the mid-2010s to the established veterans who influenced the vast majority of Gen Z’s punk and hardcore bands.”
Self-produced and self-recorded at Balboa Recording Studio in East LA, SURVIVING THE DREAM is many things for the Southern California trio comprised of Zac Carper, Max Kuehn, and Brandon Schwartzel. An embrace of their DIY roots. A reaction to the youthful kinetic energy packed into rooms at their recent live shows. A reckoning with aging and evolving. Finding themselves faced with existential downtime several years ago – brought on by a planned hiatus that was incidentally prolonged by the pandemic – FIDLAR returned feeling an odd discombobulation. In some ways everything was the same; and in others, everything was completely different. As a band whose identity has forever been tethered to getting fed up, their attitude toward it has changed. Partly that’s because they’re older now, and partly because Carper was recently diagnosed with bi-polar disorder; something that has helped him make sense of how he acted and felt at certain times in the past, especially when making music.
As a whole, they’ve grown up; no longer the young, hedonistic youths they’d been when they started out. And yet, their live shows have felt more feral than ever, with young audiences energized and full of the very reckless abandon FIDLAR stoked in their early days. It’s this burning spirit that drives SURVIVING THE DREAM: the debauchery, the feelings of angst, the carefree dispositions, and the questions of belonging that are not, and never have been bound by age. fed up, reckless, fun-loving and wild, the record is both a reminiscence of their beginnings and a testament to what they’ve become.
In celebration of the new record, FIDLAR will continue eviscerating stages this fall on their newly announced North American headlining tour. Kicking off in their homeland of Southern California, the run will see the group stopping in nearly two dozen cities before concluding in Los Angeles on Halloween. As stated by FLOOD Magazine, “the group still has plenty of gas in the tank, both in terms of creativity and raw energy. Perhaps this fact is most evident in their live show.” Tickets can be purchased now here, and complete routing information can be found below:
FIDLAR - 2024-2025 WORLD TOUR DATES
August 28 - The Station: Jindabyne, NSW *
August 29 - Waves: Wollongong, NSW *
August 30 - Enmore Theatre: Sydney, NSW *
August 31 - Bar on the Hill: Newcastle, NSW *
September 5 - Hindley Street Music Hall: Adelaide, SA *
September 6 - The Forum: Melbourne, VIC *
September 7 - Torquay Hotel: Torquay, VIC *
September 12 - The Station: Sunshine Coast, QLD *
September 13 - The Tivoli: Brisbane, QLD *
September 14 - Kingscliff Beach Hotel: Kingscliff, NSW *
September 23 - Santa Cruz, CA @The Catalyst *
September 24 - Sacramento, CA @ Ace of Spades ^
September 25 – San Francisco, CA @ The Regency Ballroom ^
September 27 – Portland, OR @ Roseland Theater ^
September 28 – Seattle, WA @ Neptune Theatre ^
September 30 – Salt Lake City, UT @ The Grand At The Complex ^
October 1 – Denver, CO @ Summit ^
October 2 - Fort Collins, CO @ Aggie Theatre ^
October 4 – Minneapolis, MN @ Varsity Theater ^
October 5 – Chicago, IL @ Vic Theatre ^
October 7 – Toronto, ON @ Phoenix Concert Theatre ^
October 8 – Buffalo, NY @ Electric City ^
October 9 – Brooklyn, NY @ Brooklyn Steel ^
October 11 - Philadelphia, PA @ Theatre of Living Arts ^
October 12 – Boston, MA @ House of Blues ^
October 14 – Washington, DC @ 9:30 Club ^
October 15 – Asheville, NC @ The Orange Peel ^
October 16 – Nashville, TN @ The Basement East ^
October 18 – Carrboro, NC @ Cat's Cradle ^
October 19 – Atlanta, GA @ Variety Playhouse ^
October 21 – Dallas, TX @ Granada Theater ^
October 22 – Austin, TX @The Mohawk ^
October 25 – Tucson, AZ @ Hotel Congress Plaza ^
October 27 - Del Mar, CA @ The Sound At Del Mar ^
October 31 - Los Angeles, CA @ The Bellwether ^
February 17-25, 2025 - Flogging Molly’s Salty Dog Cruise
* with Dune Rats
^ Headlining
In addition to “GET OFF MY WAVE” and “FIX ME,” SURVIVING THE DREAM also features FIDLAR’s single “NUDGE,” a track that followed up their comeback EP That’s Life last year that was comprised of standout songs like “Centipede,” “FSU,” “Sand On The Beach,” and “On Drugs.”
Starting out as a group of drunken punks playing gnarly house shows around Los Angeles with songs like “Cheap Beer” and “Wake Bake Skate”, the light speed rocket that was their self-titled album blasted them into the stratosphere in the early 2010s. They responded with 2015’s TOO before refining and expanding their sound with 2019’s ALMOST FREE – their last full-length album prior to SURVIVING THE DREAM.
Photo Credit: Steve Rose
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