The Strokes announce new album Reality Awaits & give new song Going Shopping live debut in San Francisco
7 April 2026, 11:43
The New York indie icons have announced the news of their seventh studio album and have performed new music.
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The Strokes have shared the news of their new album Reality Waits.
Julian Casablancas, Nikolai Fraiture, Albert Hammond Jr., Fabrizio Moretti and Nick Valensi have confirmed that their seventh studio album and the follow-up to 2020's The New Abnormal will be released in summer 2026.
The NYC rockers shared an official album tease which features an 1980s Nissan with the tagline: "In the flesh, it’s even sexier".
The retro video goes onto reveal: “Reality Awaits. The new album by The Strokes. Out this summer.”
— The Strokes (@thestrokes) April 6, 2026
The indie icons also shared what appears to be the first take from the forthcoming record, Going Shopping, which was set via a cassette tape mailed to fans.
As reported by Stereogum, fans were sent special packages with the cassette tape, which were listed out of 100 and uploaded them on to a Strokes Reddit thread.
Another helpfully shared their rip of the chilled but melodic single, which you can listen to here.
The Strokes also gave the new single its live debut on Monday (6th April) during their warm up show at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium in San Francisco.
Watch the perform the track below:
Live debut of the new Strokes single “Going Shopping”
— Ian Grant (@ian__grant) April 7, 2026
it’s a bop folks pic.twitter.com/U58kFy7eMy
The new music and warm-up shows come as the Last Nite rockers prepare to play Coachella 2026 this month, before heading out for a string of festival dates.
The band first teased new music last week by sharing pixelated 90s style visuals on their Instagram stories, which shows an old school PC notepad icon followed by horses pulling a cassette.
The link in their stories led to a Laylo page, which encouraged fans to add their number for more info, with the message: "We'll be in touch".
Their new music is hopefully the result of sessions with acclaimed producer Rick Rubin, who previously revealed he had worked with them in an "incredible" recording session in Costa Rica.
The band had confirmed he had worked with them on "magical" session back in 2022, but had given no timeline on when to expect a new album.
The Strokes' Reality Waits album follows previous releases Is This It (2001), Room on Fire (2003), First Impressions of Earth (2005), Angles (2011). Comedown Machine (2013) and The New Abnormal (2020).
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