Portland duo Pure Bathing Culture have shared the third single from their forthcoming new album Chalice to be released November 10 via First City Artists. “The Sun” is a fit release for the witching season. Danceable and spell-like, its soft, eerie beat swells into an exuberant incantation: deliver us from / up from the river / up to the sun.

Sarah Versprille and Daniel Hindman share: “‘The sun’ is a song about the lengths we go to experience progress, satiety, and hopefully some kind of deliverance from whatever haunts us. it juxtaposes the idea expressed in the river, that love and trust may be enough to achieve a state of grace. Sometimes a situation becomes too dire and when things become unendurable a radical transformation must take place.”

“This collection of songs is about the ritual of creativity, progress and transformation,” the band share. “The search for transcendence and joy, and the ability to overcome the things that haunt us.” Chalice was written from late 2019 across 2020, and co-recorded, produced and mixed with bandmate and friend Justin Chase the following year in Cottage Grove, Oregon. “It was the first time out of our home in Portland since the pandemic began, and there was something really magical about being in a small western town that was also opening up for the first time.” Whereas past Pure Bathing Culture albums have had more to do with the ether—whirring with an otherworldly, spell-like mystique—Chalice feels more grounded, an energy linking the supernatural to the natural, bringing the magic back to earth. “We wanted it all to sound like it was being played by groups of children or monks or maybe a church congregation, or even a cult.” The band recorded Hindman’s acoustic guitar over a single ribbon mic, crafting a central and recurring sound they lovingly dubbed the “Alligator Man,” then leaned into the haunting whimsy of delays and echoes, and engaged eclectic sources of rhythm —tambourines and shakers, floor toms with mallets, bells, rain sticks, wind chimes and even seagulls. “Texturally and sonically we wanted the music to feel warm and rejuvenating.”

Pre-order Chalice HERE.