Sir Elton John is teaming up with 11-time Grammy winner Brandi Carlile for a new studio album, Who Believes In Angels?
John, 77, announced the surprise project this week calling the 10-track record saying in a release that the pair “pushed each other out of their comfort zones to write and record an album completely from scratch in just 20 days.”
“This record was one of the toughest I’ve ever made, but it was also one of the greatest musical experiences of my life,” John says of the upcoming album, which will be released on April 4.
“It has given me a place where I know I can move forward. Who Believes In Angels? feels like going into another era and I’m pushing the door open to come into the future,” the five-time Grammy winner continues.
Carlile adds, “I’m still reeling from the fact that I got to do it. I think all ships rise with Elton John’s standards for songwriting, and it was an incredibly challenging and inspiring environment to work in, everybody throwing in ideas, everybody listening to everybody else’s ideas. It felt like a family. The world is a wild place to live in right now. It’s hard to find peace and triumph. It’s a radical act to seek out joyful and euphoric happenings. And that is what this album represents to me.”
According to a press release, the album mixes songs led by both artists, with John’s longtime lyricist Bernie Taupin and Carlile contributing lyrics. Andrew Watt acts as the “producer, mediator and creative conduit” for LP.
Together, the quartet have been nominated for best original song at next month’s Oscars for their closing theme song of the documentary Elton John: Never Too Late.
After wrapping his Farewell Yellow Brick Road Tour in 2023, John says his collaboration with Carlile has reinvigorated his musical interest once again.
“I have everything I’ve done behind me and it’s been brilliant, amazing. But this is the new start for me. As far as I’m concerned, this is the start of my career mark two,” he says.
Backing John and Carlile on the album are Red Hot Chili Peppers drummer Chad Smith, bassist Pino Palladino (Nine Inch Nails, John Mayer Trio) and ex-Chili Pepper guitarist Josh Klinghoffer.
Last year, in a Q&A with Variety, John called the studio sessions between the two a “lovely feeling.”
“It feels like a new beginning … This is the start of something new for me, and I’m very excited about it because, you know, I don’t want to sing Philadelphia Freedom anymore, really. And I don’t want to sing Bennie and the Jets anymore. I want to move forward,” he said.
In addition to the eponymous lead single, the duo has released a short film about the process of making Who Believes In Angels? It is the first time John has allowed cameras to film his writing and recording sessions.
In an Instagram message posted after the news of Who Believes In Angels? was released, Carlile called John her “musical soulmate.
“If you know anything about me you know this: Elton John and I have been singing together basically my whole life — he just didn’t know it. I’ve been working — and dreaming — my way towards this moment since I was 11 years old. Every album I’ve ever made has carried Elton’s name in the liner notes, my quiet thank you to the artist without whom I would have never written a song,” she wrote. “It was impossible to imagine that one day, he’d not only be my hero, but probably my best friend. In some way though I think maybe I knew?”