Empty Country

Empty Country—the latest project from Cymbals Eat Guitars frontman Joseph D’Agostino—debuted in 2020 with their self-titled record, marking D’Agostino’s first forays into the band’s yearning heartland rock and layered character portraits. Since then, he returned this year with a handful of new singles, “Pearl,” “Erkling,” and “David,” all teasing the band’s new album, Empty Country II.

Fittingly, the band’s sophomore record builds upon the foundation of its predecessor, finding D’Agostino grappling with the imagery of America’s cultural decay. The album’s stories are populated with gun violence, addiction, killers, misfits, and outcasts, exploring the desperation that runs beneath suburban life, yet sifting through it for moments of beauty. On Tuesday, he was back with the album’s fourth and final single, “Dustine,” premiering with Under the Radar.

“Dustine” is another winding sonic sprawl, colored by a pulsing bassline and gauzy guitars. The track begins as a vividly imagined road trip through the decaying suburbs of Virginia, dotted with opiate clinics, dead malls, and existential meditations (“My sister says there is a next life / No one I know will be there”). Interspersed with this imagery, D’Agostino layers in passages of gnarled guitar textures and a gentle piano-led interlude before truly letting loose in the track’s final leg, turning the track into a labyrinthine haze of effects.

Empty Country II is out November 3rd via Get Better Records in the U.S. and Tough Love Records in the UK.