Nottingham, UK-based trio EYRE LLEW — Sam Heaton (vocals, guitar), Jack Clark (drums, piano) and Jack Bennett (guitar, piano) — will be releasing their highly anticipated sophomore album Bloom on September 18, 2026 through Penance Music Group.
Bloom is deeply influenced and informed by pandemic-era quarantines and lockdowns. For the bulk of the band’s existence, they had defined themselves by seemingly constant motion: Cities blurred into one another. Border crossings were routine. Their lives revolved around airports, late night drives, ferry ports, backstage rooms, festival fields, hotel corridors and long-distance journeys. As a touring band, success, such as it exists, is often measured in miles traveled, crowd size, and momentum developed and sustained.
They kept moving at that frenetic pace, because that’s how it always was. As countless bands would view it, slowing down would mean — on some level, at least — that the momentum was slowing; that your career was stalling out. And stopping would mean accepting failure, when “making it” seemed to just within their grasp.
Much like all countless other acts across the globe, the pandemic dismantled their trajectory. That relentless forward motion that shaped their identity for the better part of a decade just suddenly stopped. Tours vanished. Plans dissolved. The result was an uneasy, unsettling silence. And understandably, for the trio, it was devastating.
However, in the stillness, something else emerged for the trio — space: For the first time in a decade, the space to rest, reflect, recover, and to make much different choices. The band made a quieter, more human recalibration, shifting away from survival towards sustainability. Rather than constantly feeling as though they had to prove something, they moved towards building something — and choosing meaning over the endless chase of momentum.
Written during lockdown and the subsequent years post-lockdown, Bloom is reportedly about several things simultaneously: presence, the love that feels like home, stillness as strength, devotion without spectacle, grief without melodrama, healing without performative optimism and growth that happens slowly, privately and honestly.
The shift in approach, fittingly led to a shift in their sound. Bloom continues to carry the vastness they’re known for, but it lives alongside a newfound sense of fragility and restraint. Instead of actively attempting to overwhelm the listener, the band is actively trying to meet the listener where they are right now.
The album will include the previously released “Miningsby,” the album title track “Bloom,” and its third and latest single “Rainbow Bridge.” “Rainbow Bridge” is a slow-burning and atmospheric tune rooted in a devastatingly confusing and heartbreaking sense of grief, nostalgia, and a life-affirming sense of gratitude that’s lived-in yet restrained. It’s your eyes tearing up over a loss with a wistful smile or a sad laugh over some idiosyncratic thing over your pet would do — or some small, mundane moment that you wish you could repeat just one more time. Sonically, the new single channels a blend of Sigur Rós and A Storm In Heaven-era The Verve.
Inspired by the much-loved poem depicting the place where departed animal companions wait to reunite with their owners in the afterlife, “Rainbow Bridge” is a personal mediation on love and loss. Written after the passing of family dogs, the song reflects on the quiet ways animals leave lasting marks on our lives, their fearless curiosity, unconditional affection, and the everyday moments that become treasured memories once they’ve gone.
“Rather than dwelling in grief, the song sits in gratitude.” the band says “It acknowledges loss, but frames it through warmth, memory, and the idea that love doesn’t disappear; it just changes shape. Rainbow Bridge is a soft tribute to the companionship.”
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