Jamie T shares first single and video from ‘The Theory of Whatever’ – watch
'The Old Style Raiders' was produced by The Maccabees' Hugo White
By Joe Goggins
Jamie T has shared his first new single in nearly six years, ‘The Old Style Raiders’ – you can see the video below.
It’s the first taste of the south London troubadour’s fifth album, ‘The Theory of Whatever’, which is set for release on July 29th. Meanwhile, his first live show in more than five years is set to be an intimate affair, at Subterania in London on May 11th.
‘The Old Style Raiders’ is one of a host of tracks on the album to have been whittled down from an initial cache of around 180, that have come together in the years since his last album, ‘Trick’, arrived in 2016. “I was struggling to find my direction with the record for a few years, really,” he revealed in a press release.
“I went home one day, and I found this track that I had recorded, pretty much fully finished,’ he says of ‘The Old Style Raiders’. “And I was really upset, because I realised that I’d spent the last six months asking other people to tell me if something was good. Then I heard this track and I just immediately knew I’d kind of found my path.”
With chiming guitars and a softly anthemic chorus, the track musically represents new territory for the singer-songwriter, full name Jamie Treays, whilst his rapid-fire vocal delivery on the verses remains as unmistakable as ever. The song was produced by Hugo White, formerly of The Maccabees; Treays has previously joined the band onstage for performances of the title track from their final album, 2016’s ‘Marks to Prove It’.
“It’s got hope in it,” he says of why ‘The Old Style Raiders’ makes an appropriate opening statement for ‘The Theory of Whatever’. “It’s fighting to find something that means enough to you that you love. The fight to find that, and to carry on striving, to find something you love enough to hold on to. Rather than kid love or movie love or, gushy love or lust love, whatever you have when you’re younger – it’s actually trying to fight for something that means more than that. It’s the struggle to find that.”
No track listing has yet been confirmed for ‘The Theory of Everything’, but it will contain 13 new songs. Fans can gain access to tickets for the London show by pre-ordering the album here by 5pm tomorrow (May 5).