Arcade Fire share new song “Unconditional I (Lookout Kid)”; new album out next week

Lis Sinatra

Arcade Fire's highly anticipated new album WE comes out next week (5/6) via Columbia, and they've now shared its second single, "Unconditional I (Lookout Kid)." Speaking to Zane Lowe on Apple Music 1 about the song, Win Butler said:

So I was really just sort of thinking about my son and the world that he's facing and how like, I was a very, very, very depressed kid, particularly in high school. I mean, in a lot of my life in general, I think that music is like my medicine in a lot of ways. But I was trying to imagine the way that I'm wired just chemically and the s**t that I've dealt with in my life, having to deal with that now in this era of like ... and not to mention now, but like 10 years from now, whenever the f**k he's going to be dealing with it. And it was just like, "Man, he's going to need to have the thick skin and to just really be able to take a hit and have some just fortitude." And I don't know, I was just sort of thinking about that and just trying to sing to him in the future or to his kids even.

Win also added that the song was partially the product of drummer Jeremy Gara laying down literally hundreds of different drum beats:

A couple years ago ... it's really hard being in a band where everyone lives in a different city. But it's like it happens sometimes as you ... we've been playing for 20 years, so it's like a certain point. Doesn't make the job any easier. So, Jeremy was coming through town. He was like, "I'm down to do some recording, but I didn't have any songs written or anything like that." And I was like, "Well, I don't want to waste, if I have a couple days with my drummer, I just certainly don't want to waste it." So I had this idea to basically, I took like maybe a hundred songs that I love and had Jeremy just play. Like I would play them to him and have him sort of play his own version, use that as a jumping off point just for different rhythms and stuff.Other people's songs, just hundreds and hundreds of songs like Sueto's songs, like different Latin songs, like disco, punk music. There's like some Nirvana, there's different things were just like, I like the drums. And I basically made like almost a rhythm box of Jeremy, just playing hundreds and hundreds of different beats so I could actually, instead of writing to a drum machine, I could actually write with my drummer. Just so it actually has a feel.

Like previous single "The Lightning, I, II," the new song feels more like classic Arcade Fire than their music has since The Suburbs, and it's another anthemic, uplifting song that really rivals their best work. Listen below.

Pre-order WE on white vinyl.