Friendly Fires are back! The St Albans-formed indie-dance trio have returned with their first new music since 2019, sharing the exuberant new single Lose All Your Friends via LAB Records. It marks the beginning of a new chapter for the band, with Ed Macfarlane and Edd Gibson now continuing Friendly Fires as a two-piece. Rather than attempting to recreate what came before, the pair have embraced a more stripped-back approach to their songwriting and recording, returning to the rawer instincts that shaped the band in their earliest days.
Friendly Fires
Lose All Your Friends is an appropriately chaotic introduction to this new era. Despite its potentially ominous title, the track is ultimately about embracing uncertainty, taking risks and accepting that sometimes losing your way is precisely how you find where you are supposed to be.
Built around an infectious groove and the band’s instinct for turning everyday moments into something euphoric, the track captures the feeling of a night that has gone completely off course — in the best possible way. There is a sense of sun-soaked hedonism running through the song, imagining that moment when the night is almost over, the sun is beginning to rise and taking the unexpected route suddenly seems like the only option worth taking.
“Don’t be afraid of change / now is the time we should be shaking it up,” Macfarlane sings, providing something of a manifesto for Friendly Fires’ return.
The band themselves sum up the philosophy behind the new material simply: “Sometimes you have to lose everything to start again. Embrace the chaos. Take a chance. Don’t be afraid of change.”
That sense of renewal extends to the way the music has been made. With the pair now working without their former three-piece setup, their creative process has moved closer to their roots. Garage recordings, live drums and a reduction in studio polish have replaced some of the more heavily produced elements of their previous work.
The result is deliberately more human and organic, allowing the songs to breathe rather than smoothing away every imperfection. It is a significant shift for a band whose blend of indie rock, electronic music and dancefloor energy helped make them one of the defining British acts of the late 2000s.
Friendly Fires first emerged with their Mercury Prize-nominated self-titled debut album in 2008. Tracks such as Paris, Jump In The Pool and Skeleton Boy established their distinctive combination of wiry guitars, electronic rhythms and Macfarlane’s distinctive vocals, while their energetic live shows quickly established them as a festival favourite.
After returning with Pala in 2011 and Inflorescent in 2019, the band have largely operated on their own timetable, emerging when they have something they genuinely want to say. Six years on from their last album, Lose All Your Friends suggests that the wait has been worthwhile.
Rather than looking backwards, Friendly Fires are using the return as an opportunity to rediscover what made the band exciting in the first place. The emphasis on spontaneity, live performance and experimentation gives the new track a sense of movement, while its central message of accepting change feels particularly appropriate for a band entering a new phase of their career.
The comeback will also be taken to the stage, with Friendly Fires set to perform a run of dates in the US alongside Two Door Cinema Club before returning to London for Bugged Out! 2026 in October.
The London appearance will provide a homecoming of sorts and a chance to hear Lose All Your Friends in a live setting, alongside material from a catalogue that has helped bridge the gap between indie rock and electronic dance music for almost two decades.
For a band that has never been particularly interested in rushing the process, Friendly Fires’ return feels suitably unhurried — but with ‘Lose All Your Friends’, they have certainly arrived ready to shake things up.
Upcoming UK Live Date:
OCTOBER
10th – London, UK – Bugged Out! 2026
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