Northumbrian electro-folk musician and producer Frankie Archer today announces her debut album ‘The Dance Of Death’ – out 5 June via prrr of the bear – and releases new single ‘The Unquiet Grave’ following a premiere on BBC Radio 2‘s Folk Show. Frankie Archer’s debut album follows the release of her 2024 EP ‘Pressure and Persuasion’ and 2023’s ‘Never So Red’.
On ‘The Dance Of Death’, Archer reconstructs some of the oldest songs in the English canon with fractured, future-facing production. Working from archival ballads of obsession, devotion and loss, she warps fiddle lines, processes her own vocals and drives the material with pulsing drum machines and colourful synth arrangements.
Co-produced with Guy Massey (Kylie Minogue, Spiritualized, Richard Hawley), the record expands English folk into something immersive and modern. Influenced by the work of Little Dragon, Hannah Peel, Rosalía, Björk and Bat for Lashes, Archer approaches folk as a producer first.
Inspired by the medieval Danse Macabre, ‘The Dance Of Death’ is, in Archer’s words, “a collection of nu-ancient trad bangers” – stark narratives of mortality and longing rebuilt through meticulous studio experimentation.
On the release of new single ‘The Unquiet Grave’, Frankie Archer said:
“The Unquiet Grave is about grief, love, and letting go. The song echoes the idea that excessive grieving can disturb the dead, and plays out in a conversation between a woman and her lost love. I really wanted to focus on the joy and love in the relationship, celebrating the closeness and tenderness of the two souls in the story, so I made an electropop-feeling chorus to uplift them and everyone listening.”
Frankie Archer‘s debut album ‘The Dance Of Death’ is out 5 June. Frankie will tour the album this autumn with dates in London, Liverpool, Gateshead, Bristol and Birmingham. New single ‘The Unquiet Grave’ is out now.
Live Dates
- 27 September – Gateshead, The Glasshouse
- 30 September – Liverpool, Liverpool Philharmonic
- 01 October – London, King’s Place
- 02 October – Bristol, St George’s
- 03 October – Birmingham, Midlands Arts Centre
Pop Scoop founder and editor. Ex showbiz/tech editor at the Cyprus Mail. Former sub-editor at Archant. Former art director Sky TV. Co-founder of Kool Magazine and freelanced for the BBC, Channel 4, Warner Bros and the Cyprus Broadcasting Corporation.
