(July 16, 2021 – Toronto, ON) Today, multi-platinum band Barenaked Ladies release their 16th studio album Detour de Force. The eagerly awaited album was produced by JUNO and Grammy award winner Eric Ratz and Mark Howard, and features 14 newly minted tracks including the hopeful and infectious new single “Good Life”. Detour de Force is available on CD and digital formats, along with a limited edition blue double vinyl featuring a bonus track. Stream / purchase Detour de Force HERE. Due to manufacturing and shipping delays related to COVID-19, the in-store date for vinyl for the US has been delayed until August 20th.

The music video for “Good Life” also premieres today. Directed by Edward Pond, the video features the band playfully navigating their beloved hometown of Toronto. “This song is the story of the band and how I feel about the band,” says Ed Robertson. “I’m not living the dream, I’m re-living the dream. I lived the dream twenty years ago; the real dream is that I’m still doing this.” Watch the official video for “Good Life” HERE.

Ed Robertson will be featured on an episode of STROMBO today at 5:00pm ET on Apple Music and the band will be participating in the Twitter Listening Party hosted by Tim Burgess on Monday, July 19th at 2:00pm ET.

Detour de Force is BNL’s most broad-reaching and diverse album to date — fusing the distinct writing voices of Robertson, Hearn and Creeggan into a cohesive work. “Our band is very diverse in what we do,” says Robertson, “and on this record I really enjoyed the exploration. This record is a journey. Taking off one song would tip it in a way we didn’t feel was representative of the record we made. We wanted everything that’s here to be part of the record.”

 Adds Tyler Stewart, “This is some of our strongest material in 30 years, easily. I think it stands up there with our best albums. It hangs with ‘Gordon,’ or it hangs with ‘Maroon.’”

 BNL wasn’t dormant as the world shut down but the pause brought a fresh perspective to where the band wanted Detour de Force to go. “The pandemic really affected the album in an interesting way,” recalls Jim Creeggan, who penned a pair of the Detour de Force songs. “I was getting calls from friends to do remote-based stuff, people asking each other to add something to those projects. So we started reaching out and bringing other things into what we were doing.”

“We took several detours de force,” acknowledges Kevin Hearn, “but I think what you get is a beautiful hybrid of a live off-the-floor band, all the way to full-on production numbers.’ It’s kind of reminiscent of ‘Stunt’.”

 “There was a lot that was amazing about recording at the cottage,” recalls Robertson, who wrote songs on his own and with friends Kevin Griffin, Craig Wiseman, Danny Michel and Donovan Woods. “The focus was great. The vibe was great. The hang was great. It was super positive for the band dynamic.”  “It’s a surreal experience to write with someone whose songs you’ve known and admired for what feels like your whole life,” says Donovan Woods about writing with Robertson. “(Ed) and I sat for hours talking about ideas. We ended up with two songs I love so much (“Man Made Lake” and “God Forbid”) that I had to record them, too. Hearing BNL’s versions was another surreal moment. It’s an honor to have a small credit in such an amazing catalogue.”

 Detour de Force Tracklist

1. Flip
2. Good Life
3. New Disaster
4. Big Back Yard
5. Live Well
6. Flat Earth
7. Here Together
8. Roll Out
9. Bylaw
10. God Forbid
11. Paul Chambers
12. The National Park
13. Man Made Lake
14. Internal Dynamo
15. Way Of The Heart (Vinyl-only exclusive bonus track)

Coming up, Barenaked Ladies are getting back to work, with a run of one-off shows, starting with their first show in seventeen months next weekend on July 24th at the New Jersey Festival of Ballooning in Whitehall Station, New Jersey. BNL will tour the UK in March and will bring the Last Summer on Earth tour to North America in June of 2022.  

Barenaked Ladies are also proud to announce a commitment to REVERB’s Music Climate Revolution. Joining other touring artists, music industry leaders, and fans, they are making an ongoing and increasing commitment to reduce their carbon footprint, support carbon-fighting projects, and use their voice to demand climate action. Barenaked Ladies have long been an active participant in the environmental movement in music, as the first artist to work with REVERB, in 2004. More at musicclimaterevolution.org.

Over the course of 33 years, the beloved quartet has sold 15 million records worldwide and built up an arsenal of hits such as “If I Had $1,000,000”, “One Week”, “Pinch Me” and “The Big Bang Theory Theme.” Widely acknowledged as one of the best live acts on the planet, BNL has hosted a cruise, had its own ice cream flavor, amassed eight JUNO Awards, and was inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame in 2018. As Ed Robertson, Jim Creeggan, Tyler Stewart and Kevin Hearn put it on ‘Good Life,’ “Wasn’t easy but it turned out alright/Wouldn’t trade it for another…You don’t wanna miss this mutha.” 

Today, multi-platinum band Barenaked Ladies announce their 16th studio album Detour de Force will be released on July 16, 2021. Produced by JUNO and Grammy award winner Eric Ratz and Mark Howard, the eagerly awaited album features 14 newly minted tracks including “Flip”, the buoyant and sonically adventurous debut single and BNL’s first new music in four years. Detour de Force is available to pre-order starting today HERE and is available on CD and digital formats, along with a limited edition blue double vinyl featuring a bonus track. See below for a full tracklist.

Along with the announcement, the band has released a driving, and topical pop-rock gem titled “New Disaster”. Says Ed Robertson, “’New Disaster’ is about the distraction of modern politics coupled with the pressures of the 24-hour news cycle. It seemed like the Nostradamus predictions of new disasters were getting worse and worse, even after we recorded the song.” The official music video for will be released on June 11.

Detour de Force is BNL at its most ambitious, accomplished, intricate, intentional — and, in some ways, circumstantial. Its gestation was long and exacerbated (as so many things have been) by the global pandemic. The good news is that it’s BNL’s most broad-reaching and diverse work to date — fusing the distinct writing voices of Robertson, Hearn and Creeggan into a cohesive work from the stand-out tracks “Flip”, “New Disaster”, and “Good Life”, to the uptempo fun of “Flat Earth”, the playful and country-flavoured “Roll Out” to the gentle melodics of “Live Well”, “The National Park”, “God Forbid” and “Man Made Lake” to the sonic roller coaster of the album-closing “Internal Dynamo”.

The depth goes beyond sonics throughout the album. Though there’s certainly the verbal playfulness and whimsy that’s part of BNL’s stock in trade, many of the songs have a reflective and philosophical, sometimes topical, underpinning that’s also long been part of the BNL makeup.

“We’ve always liked that our band is very diverse in what we do,” says Robertson, “and on this record I really enjoyed the exploration. This record is a journey. Taking off one song would tip it in a way we didn’t feel was representative of the record we made. We wanted everything that’s here to be part of the record.”

Adds Tyler Stewart, “This is some of our strongest material in 30 years, easily. I think it stands up there with our best albums. It hangs with ‘Gordon,’ or it hangs with ‘Maroon.’

BNL wasn’t dormant as the world shut down — evidence the group’s spirited “Selfie Cam Jam” series and Robertson’s weekly Friday livestreams online, both for charity, as well as a pair of virtual concerts. But the pause brought a fresh perspective to where the band wanted Detour de Force to go.

“The pandemic really affected the album in an interesting way,” recalls Jim Creeggan, who penned a pair of the Detour de Force songs. “I was getting calls from friends to do remote-based stuff, people asking each other to add something to those projects. So we started reaching out and bringing other things into what we were doing.”

“We took several detours de force,” acknowledges Kevin Hearn, “but I think what you get is a beautiful hybrid of a live off-the-floor band, all the way to full-on production numbers.’ It’s kind of reminiscent of ‘Stunt’.”

“There was a lot that was amazing about recording at the cottage,” recalls Robertson, who wrote songs on his own and with friends Kevin Griffin, Craig Wiseman, Donovan Woods and Danny Michel. “The focus was great. The vibe was great. The hang was great. It was super positive for the band dynamic.”  Virtual guests were also invited, including original BNL keyboardist Andy Creeggan (Jim’s brother), all-star singer and bassist Fernando Saunders and MOOG bass pedals borrowed from Rush’s Geddy Lee even make an appearance.

Filmed and edited by Edward Pond, the band has released a Detour de Force teaser that captures the making of the album – from the snowy cold of northern Ontario in a make-shift recording studio in Robertson’s living room with Mark Howard, completing the album with the inimitable Eric Ratz at Noble Street Studios in Toronto. Watch it here.

Barenaked Ladies rescheduled their extensive Last Summer On Earth tour to 2022. All previously purchased tickets and VIP packages will remain valid for 2022. Check the routing and contact the original point of purchase for any questions.

Over the course of 33 years, the beloved quartet has sold 15 million records worldwide and built up an arsenal of hits such as “If I Had $1,000,000,” “One Week,” “Pinch Me” and “The Big Bang Theory Theme.” Widely acknowledged as one of the best live acts on the planet, BNL has hosted a cruise, had its own ice cream flavor, amassed eight JUNO Awards, and was inducted into the Canadian Music Hall of Fame in 2018. As Ed Robertson, Jim Creeggan, Tyler Stewart and Kevin Hearn put it on ‘Detour de Force,’ “Wasn’t easy but it turned out alright/Wouldn’t trade it for another…You don’t wanna miss this mutha.”

Detour de Force Tracklist

1. Flip
2. Good Life
3. New Disaster
4. Big Back Yard
5. Live Well
6. Flat Earth
7. Here Together
8. Roll Out
9. Bylaw
10. God Forbid
11. Paul Chambers
12. The National Park
13. Man Made Lake
14. Internal Dynamo
15. Way Of The Heart (Vinyl-only exclusive bonus track)

Today, multi-platinum band Barenaked Ladies release the upbeat new single and

video “Flip”, their first new music in four years from BNL’s upcoming 16th studio album Detour de Force. The band is set to perform the new single Friday, April 16th on the Today Show. This will be followed by the band’s global streaming event Flip n’ Hits with BNL: A Night of Monster Jams of PandemicProportions, to air on Saturday, April 17 at 9pm EDT / 6pm PDT with an encore on Sunday, April 18 at 8pm GMT. The show will be 60 minutes of their greatest hits, including “Flip”. Singer-songwriter KT Tunstall will appear as a very special guest.

The recording of “Flip” has been a major journey for Barenaked Ladies. Originally the group began work on new music before the pandemic, but quarantine forced them out of the studio and into their respective homes. The last year has been one of major changes and “flips” for the world, and the new music reflects that. At first listen, “Flip” is an upbeat trademark Barenaked Ladies classic filled with new sparks and fresh flavor. However, with further inspection, listeners will note its nuanced take on the human psyche, conflicts in our communities, and the many ‘flips’ that have occurred all over the world during this last year. The stop-motion animated video, created using original paper models and directed by Stefano Bertelli, follows the band on a colorful pop-up book journey through an amusement park full of surprises.

In an interview with Consequence of Sound, lead vocalist/guitarist Ed Robertson explains, “’Flip’ is about being open to other perspectives. We live in a time where people seem to just dig deeper into their own trenches, without any willingness to see another viewpoint, or even engage in discussion… It’s all yelling, and no listening. I like that saying, ‘We were given one mouth, and two ears, and we’re supposed to use them proportionately!’”

Stream / purchase “Flip” HERE | Watch the creative, stop-motion animation video for “Flip” HERE