When Stormzy made his return to social media after a two-year hiatus earlier this week (Oct. 12), fans felt sure it could only mean one thing, new music on the way.
The South London legend made fans wait nearly three years for his comeback single, “Mel Made Me Do It,” released last month. However, Stormzy rewarded their patience with an iconic track and accompanying video, setting levels for his peers in the process.
Then, on Thursday evening, Stormzy announced the arrival of his third studio album, This Is What I Mean, due to arrive next month.
Stormzy Announces New Album
He shared the artwork for his upcoming project on Instagram, the lone post on his account. The album’s cover depicts a letter sitting on a doorstep with the name of the album printed on it. Check out the tracklist below.
A press statement describes the project as “an intimate love letter to music” created at a “Stormzy music camp” in Osea Island, off the east coast of England.
“When you hear about music camps they always sound intense and sombre,” Stormzy explained of making the new album, as per NME. “People saying: ‘We need to make an album.’ ‘We need to make some hit records.’ But this felt beautifully free. We’re all musicians but we weren’t always doing music. Some days we played football or walked around taking pictures. And the bi-product to that was very beautiful music.”
Stormzy continued, “Because when you marry that ethos with world class musicians and the best producers, writers and artists in the world, and we’re in one space, that’s a recipe for something that no one can really imagine. You can’t even calculate what that’s going to come up with. And it came up with a big chunk of this album.”
This Is What I Mean follows Stormzy’s U.K. No.1 album, 2019’s Heavy Is The Head, and is due for release on Nov. 25 via 0207 Def Jam. Click here to pre-order.