Between Self-Destruction and Salvation, A.S. Fanning Unveils Final Single Ahead of Album Release New Single ‘Stay Alive’

Between Self-Destruction and Salvation, A.S. Fanning Unveils Final Single Ahead of Album Release

New Single ‘Stay Alive’ out January 23rd

Take Me Back To Nowhere out February 6th 2026

via K&F Records

*UK Tour Dates Announced*

STREAM

Photo Credit: Neil Hoare

“States of anxiety set to music”

ROLLING STONE

“The sound of an artist pushing himself to the brink”

CLASH

“Mushroom Cloud is a superb effort from a songwriter following his muse to unfamiliar territory and reaping the rewards. It’s a 21st-century Franz Kafka turns indie album; if only he was a little bit funnier and had a soothing baritone.”

FAR OUT MAGAZINE

Irish songwriter A.S. Fanning releases ‘Stay Alive’ on January 23rd, the third and final single from his forthcoming fourth studio album Take Me Back To Nowhere (February 6th, K&F Records).

In the midst of an album preoccupied with fragmented realities and psychological dislocation, ‘Stay Alive’ arrives as an unexpected lifeline—a love song born from the depths of despair. The track unfolds with haunting beauty, its ethereal synths and strings wrapping around Fanning’s echoing baritone as the song builds toward an anthemic crescendo. Moody, dark, and melancholic, it captures the precise moment when connection pierces through numbness.

“This is a love song written from a place of desperation and despondency,” Fanning explains. “About going through the world in a depressive drudge, with flickering notions of stepping in front of trains, only to chance upon something or someone that reminds you why you’re alive, that makes you feel connected to something bigger than yourself.”

While previous singles ‘Romance’ and ‘Today Is For Forgetting’ explored emotional desolation and psychedelic consciousness, ‘Stay Alive’ confronts a more primal terror: the fear of one’s own mind. During its creation, Fanning was reading Ursula K. Le Guin’s ‘The Lathe of Heaven’ and found himself arrested by a line where the psychiatrist tells the protagonist, “you’re afraid of your own mind.” “That’s something I can relate to,” Fanning notes. The song exists in that space between self-destruction and salvation, where a single encounter—with a person, a moment, a feeling—can tip the balance.

This latest offering deepens the album’s exploration of disorder and the collapse of shared reality, offering another insight into Take Me Back To Nowhere which emerged from a period of creative disruption. After breaking his wrist early in the writing process, Fanning found his usual songwriting methods fundamentally altered. Unable to absent-mindedly play guitar—a crucial tool for engaging his instincts—he turned to furious early-morning sessions of stream-of-consciousness writing, producing pages of fragmented lyrics that initially filled him with anxiety and paralysis. “The tyranny of endless words, floating in chaos and disorder,” as he describes it.

During this time, Fanning immersed himself in science fiction literature, particularly the works of Ursula K. Le Guin and J.G. Ballard. Le Guin’s The Lathe of Heaven—about a man whose dreams alter reality—opened up a genre he’d previously avoided, and he found deep resonance with its premise that “reality is just a foundation to build on.” Ballard’s exploration of psychological landscapes and his loss of faith in presented reality particularly influenced the album’s themes.

“I think a combination of all these things led me to some of the themes of this album,” Fanning explains. “Accepting that there is no objective reality, and that each of us are profoundly isolated from one another, unable to reach any common ground or understanding. Struggling to rectify our individual experience of the world into any unifying concept, or agreed shared reality. Embracing disorder seemed to be the healthiest way to deal with this.”

The album’s working title was Greetings from the Depths of Confusion. Rather than following a clear narrative, Fanning aimed to create something intentionally disorienting while maintaining a cohesive world and atmosphere both lyrically and musically. The title Take Me Back To Nowhere expresses a desire to escape completely—“to return to a world beyond reason, of unexistence.”

Drawing from Irish literary tradition and folk music while incorporating elements of 60s psychedelia and rock ‘n’ roll, Fanning has carved out a unique space in the European indie landscape. Since relocating to Berlin following the dissolution of his previous band The Last Tycoons, he has released three critically acclaimed solo albums: Second Life (2017), You Should Go Mad (2020), and Mushroom Cloud (2023), which earned him Songwriter of the Year honors from Far Out Magazine.

Fanning has toured extensively throughout Europe and beyond, showcasing at SXSW, and performing at renowned festivals including Ireland Music Week, Endless Daze (South Africa), Left of the Dial (Netherlands), Live At Heart (Sweden), and Orange Blossom Special (Germany). In June 2024, he was invited to perform on German national television’s legendary Rockpalast programme, cementing his reputation as one of the most compelling voices in contemporary indie-folk.

‘Stay Alive’ arrives January 23rd, whilst the album Take Me Back To Nowhere follows February 6th 2026 via K&F Records.

TAKE ME BACK TO NOWHERE