Alternative rock musician Mark Lanegan has released a new track titled “Stockholm City Blues,” which will be featured on his upcoming studio album Straight Songs of Sorrow. This upcoming project will be released on May 8th via Heavenly Recordings, and is based on his upcoming memoir Sing Backwards And Weep, out on April 28th.

“Stockholm City Blues” is a somber track, with a minimalist instrumental consisting of only a simple acoustic guitar and some strings. Lanegan’s vocals are delivered in a similar soft spoken manner, as he reminisces of his previous shortcomings and the trauma that it left him with.

The song follows the themes of the album’s previously released singles “Skeleton Key” and “Bleed All Over,” which documents his experiences living in the underbelly of Seattle’s iconic grunge scene in the 1990s. It also directly confronts the trauma he has experienced as a result of these memories, and how it has shaped him today.

“Writing the book, I didn’t get catharsis,” Lanegan stated in a press release. “All I got was a Pandora’s box full of pain and misery. I went way in, and remembered shit I’d put away 20 years ago. But I started writing these songs the minute I was done, and I realised there was a depth of emotion because they were all linked to memories from this book. It was a relief to suddenly go back to music. Then I realized that was the gift of the book: these songs. I’m really proud of this record.”

Check out our interview with Lanegan here.

Photo Credit: Raymond Flotat