LIVE DRUGS

Culled from over 40 hard drives of recorded live shows spread out across years of touring behind multiple critically acclaimed records, LIVE DRUGS is unlike anything previously available in The War on Drugs’ catalog.

Work began in late 2018, then fell by the wayside until this past March, when [Adam] Granduciel stumbled upon the mixes in a Dropbox folder. Inspired to finally finish with fresh ears, Granduciel and East poured through the vaults of live multi-tracks, sending final selections for mixing to Jonathan Low at Aaron Dessner’s Long Pond Studio.

“It puts a nice exclamation point on our touring because we’ve memorialized the performances in a way,” Granduciel says. “It feels like it’s kind of a reset, to be able to put something out that’s a really good interpretation of the way we interpret our music live. There’s something cathartic about having all of it printed on a record. Even though this recording is from a year of tours, this is really how these six guys evolved as a band from 2014 to 2019.”