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ARIA-award winner
CHET FAKER
unveils sophomore album
HOTEL SURRENDER

BUY/STREAM HERE
out now via DETAIL RECORDS/BMG

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CHET FAKER

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Five-time ARIA-award winning producer, songwriter and artist Nick Murphy, today delivers the highly awaited second album from his Chet Faker project, Hotel Surrender via his own label Detail Records in partnership with BMG.

Six years after stepping away from the project, Melbourne-raised, New York-based Murphy revived Chet Faker in October 2020, marking a milestone return to making music that simply felt good. The primed result is Hotel Surrender: a 10-track LP written, recorded and produced by Murphy and mixed by Dave Fridmann (Tame Impala, Flaming Lips, MGMT) that reintroduces the world, and Murphy himself, to Chet Faker. At once intimate and gregarious, the electrifying swagger of Hotel Surrender is undeniable and irresistible.

Joining his billion plus-streaming catalogue, Murphy completed Hotel Surrender during the first few months of the global pandemic, finding respite in his small NYC recording studio – the first space he had to himself since writing and recording his debut LP, Built on Glass. Working in isolation for the first time in years, Murphy found himself writing songs that reached outward, striving to find joy and light in an otherwise dark time.

By mid-2020, Murphy realised what he had: “I just remember looking at it in a playlist and just being like, ‘Ah, shit, this is a Chet Faker album.’ It just sort of showed up and I had a decision to make – do I put this out?”

The reverberating opener, “Oh Me Oh My” sits below Murphy’s baritone spoken word as strings play a familiar melody to boldly proclaim the return of Chet Faker. ‘It’s not what I say, it’s what I do’ says Murphy, declaring a calm and confident mantra for the journey ahead. Next, the album’s debut single, “Low” sees an ambient flurry of muted bass plucks and echoed guitar hints at earlier era Chet Faker-like blues with melancholy-serene pop sentiments. An ooze of soothing goodness continues, on “Get High”, as a swinging piano intro set to a funk-addled backbeat, evokes deep-seated soul and groove textures. The album’s third single, “Whatever Tomorrow”, presses further on the big questions only Murphy is unafraid to ask. Slow and punchy, Murphy croons atop, addressing our future’s ambivalence in the wake of a year of uncertainty and the pandemic.

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“It’s Not You” follows, a heart-on-sleeve dissection of Murphy’s feelings and self-awareness as he coos atop a brass section. The invitingly warm analog synth lines on “Peace of Mind” cradles a slower song of fragile beauty as Murphy unravels the inner-workings of his mind. Raw vulnerability extends to “Feel Good”, the record’s fourth single with a swagger that is Murphy’s staple setting. Equally refreshing is “I Must Be Stupid”, the piano line allows Murphy’s vocals to extend to their full range, reaching peak catharsis in all their slow-grooving glory. “So Long, So Lonely” is an awe-inspiring mix of instrumentation that sees crackling percussion cushion the instant and toe-tapping groove. Final track, “In Too Far” is a conclusive statement of utmost warmth and intimacy that is emotionally-intuitive proving simplicity can prevail.

The Chet Faker project launched to worldwide acclaim in the early 2010s with a handful of EPs—including a collaborative volume with then-breaking Flume—covers and remixes. His 2014 debut album, Built on Glass, won five ARIAs, topped charts worldwide and earned the #1 spot on triple j’s Hottest 100 that year. Under his own name, Murphy has released the 2017 EP Missing Link, 2019’s much lauded studio album Run Fast Sleep Naked and an instrumental record, Music For Silence, first premiered on the meditation app Calm in March 2020.

Signing to BMG last year, Murphy shared “Low” as the first Chet Faker release since 2015. The success of the track led to a sophomore live appearance on NBC’s The Ellen DeGeneres Show, and a #70 triple j Hottest 100 spot, reaffirming his limitless capacity for emotional connection. Along with “Low”, the follow-up singles, “Get High”, “Whatever Tomorrow” and “Feel Good” have amassed over 23 million streams on Spotify alone, landed hundreds of placements on prominent playlists across Apple Music, Spotify and Amazon Music, and drawn widespread attention from around the globe including the likes of Rolling Stone, Hypebeast, NME, Uproxx, Consequence of Sound and more.

Chet Faker has re-emerged on premier festival bills around the world including Austin City Limits 2021 and Primavera Sound 2022, as well as the just announced and now on sale North American headline shows in March 2022.

Hotel Surrender swiftly asserts how effortless and genuine the soul-striking grooves flow from Nick Murphy, as its release today marks the dawning of a rebirthed Chet Faker that demands to be heard on repeat.

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HOTEL SURRENDER LP is out now
VIA DETAIL RECORDS/BMG
BUY/STREAM HERE

HOTEL SURRENDER
TRACKLIST

1. Oh Me Oh My
2. Low
3. Get High
4. Whatever Tomorrow
5. It’s Not You
6. Peace of Mind
7. Feel Good
8. Stupid
9. So Long So Lonely
10. In Too Far

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Follow CHET FAKER
Website – Facebook – Twitter – Instagram

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AMNPLIFY – JC