The Drums have debuted a new song titled “Isolette” today, the latest preview of figure-head Jonny Pierce’s forthcoming sixth studio album Jonny. An album a lifetime in the making, Jonny is a body of work imbued with forgiveness and self-acceptance for the parts of himself that he’d previously blanched away from: the scared, hurt kid who worked hard to survive an abusive home, the young adult who peered out at the world through a hardened shell. Distilled aptly on the springy, guitar-gilded “Isolette” – the French word for ‘incubator’ – he delves into how that seal between himself and the world both offered a level of safety and led him into emotional starvation.

“My mother experienced what is referred to as a birth trauma when she was pregnant with me,” says Pierce about the inspiration for “Isolette.” “A doctor broke her water without her consent, and she immediately went into painful, traumatic labor. I was born prematurely. They rushed me into an incubator where no one was able to touch me. Over the course of the pandemic, I took a lot of psych courses. In child psych, I learned that it is of utmost importance for a mother to have skin contact with her baby. It’s fundamental for bonding. We didn’t have that. The love and trust you get from that initial bonding influences how you feel love and trust in future relationships. My mother had been violated at the time of my birth and I believe I became a symbol of that trauma. She detached from me emotionally, so on many levels I often feel like I never really left the isolette.”

Heartbreaking, playful, raucous, and serene all in turn, Jonny is a collection of songs that confronts the deep-rooted childhood trauma Pierce experienced growing up in a cult-like religious community in upstate New York, and triumphs over the long shadow it cast on his life and relationships for years. The record is filled with self-reflective songs as well a series of minute-long vignettes that ground the album in gentle introspection as Pierce sings directly to his younger selves.

Pre-order Jonny HERE.