Cancelled. Concert: Austra (Sold Out)

Cancelled. Concert: Austra (Sold Out)

Austra announces her return with the blistering new single “Risk It”; her first new music since 2017’s Future Politics. On “Risk It,” she pitches her voice up over a chorus of brass instruments to capture the desperation in feeling scared to leave a relationship.

Katie Austra Stelmanis has been better known by her middle name for three albums, ten years, and countless tours. She wrote, produced, and performed all her own records, occasionally sharing the spotlight with a band to tour live. From the outside, things were going really well for a while: she built a devoted fan base and sold out shows all around the world. However, on the inside, Stelmanis was beginning to feel stagnant and uninspired. “I was losing faith in my own ideas,” she explains. Without realising it, she’d got caught up in a toxic relationship that was tearing her apart. Austra felt the need to cut ties, personally and professionally, and start all over again. On “Risk It”, she worked with external producers for the first time, bringing in Rodaidh McDonald and Joseph Shabason to assist on production duties. “Risk It” additionally features kamanche (Kurdish violin) and cello from Canadian duo Kamancello and percussion from noise artists c_RL.