Corridor share new single & visualiser “Mon Argent” from new album 'Mimi' out April 26th on Sub Pop (worldwide) & Canada (Bonsound) and announce UK shows.
A Lite Brite, falling pennies, and trinkets adorn the hypnotic looping visual for Corridor’s “Mon Argent,” a new single shared today from ‘Mimi’, the Montreal band’s forthcoming new album, out on April 26th via Sub Pop (Bonsound in Canada). The single comes as the band announce extensive UK and European live dates, including appearances at The Great Escape and a free show in London.
Corridor’s 'Mimi'—which, fun fact, is also named after guitarist and vocalist Jonathan Robert’s cat—is a record about “getting older” and “figuring out new parts of life”—but despite any claims of transitional growing pains from the band, ‘Mimi’ is also a record bursting with new energy and life.
The band expand on the sounds of their 2019 Sub Pop debut, 'Junior,' and deliver an album with a distinct rhythmic pulse reminiscent of post-punk’s own classic era of melding dance and rock textures.
‘Mimi’ is an eight-track offering, produced by Corridor and Joojoo Ashworth (Dummy, Automatic) at Studio Gamma in Montreal and mastered by Heba Kadry Mastering in Brooklyn. All songs on ‘Mimi’ were composed by Corridor, with lyrics written by guitarist and vocalist Jonathan Robert. It’s their first new music since ‘Junior’, the band’s prismatic Sub Pop debut, released in 2019.
It is now available to preorder from Sub Pop. LP preorders of the album from megamart.subpop.com and select independent retailers in North America will receive the Loser Edition on Baby Pink vinyl. LP orders from Mega Mart 2 (the new, UK-based sibling site to the world-famous Sub Pop Mega Mart) and select independent retailers in the UK and Europe, will receive the Loser Edition on Blue vinyl. All whilst stock lasts.
About Corridor’s Mimi:
You get older, you have a family, and you start to slow down—that’s how things are supposed to go, right? Not for Montreal band Corridor, who have returned on their fourth album, 'Mimi', with a sound and style that’s more widescreen and expansive than anything that’s preceded it. The follow-up to 2019’s 'Junior' is a huge step forward for the band, as the members themselves have undergone the type of personal changes that accompany the passage of time; even as these eight songs reflect a newfound and contemplative maturity, however, Corridor are branching out more than ever with richly detailed music, resulting in a record that feels like a fresh break for a band that’s already established themselves as forward-thinkers.
'Mimi' immediately recalls the best of the best when it comes to indie rock—Deerhunter’s silvery atmospherics immediately come to mind, as well as the spiky effervescence of classic post-punk—but despite these easy comparisons, Corridor remain impossible to pin down from song to song, which makes Mimi all the more thrilling as a listen.
The road to this point, as roads to greatness often are, was not without challenge; if the elastic guitar rock of Junior came together quickly—or, as guitarist and vocalist Jonathan Robert describes the process, “in a rush”—then the steady-as-they-go creative pace of Mimi marked a desire to break from the “exhausting” work ethic that previously birthed 'Junior'.
“The goal was to work differently, which is the goal we have every time we work on a new album—to build something in a new way,”
Robert explains.
“This time, we took our time.”
And so in the summer of 2020, Corridor’s members—Robert, vocalist/bassist Dominic Berthiaume, drummer Julien Bakvis, and multi-instrumentalist Samuel Gougoux—holed away in a cottage to engage in the sort of creative experimentation that would lead to Mimi’s ultimate creation.
“We went there to write, and a lot of ideas came from that retreat,”
Berthiaume explains.
“We didn’t end up with songs as much as we did ideas, so the result is a collage of the ideas.”
After that productive session together, Corridor continued to tinker with the songs’ raw parts digitally and remotely over the next few years, with co-producer Joojoo Ashworth (Dummy, Automatic) lending their own specific talents in the theoretical booth. The process was a byproduct of not having access to their previous rehearsal space as the COVID-19 pandemic faded from public view, but also a result of the four-piece leaning harder into incorporating electronic textures than on previous records.
“For a long time, we identified as a guitar-oriented band, and the goal of making this whole record was trying to get away from that,”
Berthiaume states while admitting that the band encountered their own challenges as a result:
“We had to figure out how to make new songs without having the chance to play together. It was complicated sometimes.”
Berthiaume also describes 'Mimi' as a record about “getting older” and “figuring out new parts of life”—but despite any claims of transitional growing pains from the band, 'Mimi' is a record bursting with new energy and life, a vibrance that’s owed in no small part to Gougoux joining the band full-time after pitching in on live performances in the past.
'Mimi' embraces and champions unfettered creativity while paving a way for Corridor’s own bright future.
“We just focused on making a record that sounded the way we wanted,”
Gougoux exclaims while discussing the band’s aims.
“There were no limitations when it came to what was possible.”
Live dates:
Sat. Mar. 09 - Mexico City, MX - Pitchfork Music Festival Mexico City *
Tue. Mar. 12 - Los Angeles, CA - Ghengis Cohen
Wed. Mar. 13 - Austin, TX - SXSW
Thu. Mar. 14 - Austin, TX - SXSW
Fri. Mar. 15 - Austin, TX - SXSW
Sat. May 11 - Esch-sur-Alzette, LU - Centre Culturel Kulturfabrik (Out Of The Crowd Festival)
Mon. May 13 - Brussels, BE - Botanique
Wed. May 15 - Leeds, UK - Hyde Park Book Club
Thu. May 16 - London, UK - Shacklewell Arms (Free Show - RSVP here)
Sat, May 18 - Brighton, UK - The Great Escape Festival (Patterns)
Thu. May 30 - McGill, NV - Schellraiser Festival
Wed, Nov 06 - Paris, FR - La Maroquinerie
Thu, Nov 07 - Lorient, FR Festival Indisciplines @ Hydrophone
Fri, Nov 08 - Amiens, FR La Lune des Pirates
Sat, Nov 09 - Lille, FR - L'Aeronef
Sun, Nov 10 - Laval, FR - 6PAR4 (Matinee Show at 5.30pm)
Tue, Nov 12 - Limoges, FR - Jean-Gagnant
Wed, Nov 13 - La Roche Sur-Yon, FR - Quai M
Thu, Nov 14 - Bordeaux, FR - Rock School Barbey
Fri, Nov 15 - Rouen, FR - Le 106
Sat, Nov 16 - Caen, FR - Le Cargö
Fri. Oct. 04 - Montreal, QC Le National
* supporting King Krule