Modern Nature share new single "Shasta" ahead of North American tour that begins tomorrow!

photo credit: Michael Stasiak

2025 has been another hugely successful year for Modern Nature. The band’s new album The Heat Warps was released late August to universal acclaim and landed at Number 15 in Uncut’s Albums of the Year list. Today, following the band’s recent sold-out UK tour and ahead of an extensive North American tour that begins tomorrow, Modern Nature are sharing new single “Shasta” a subtle gem inspired by the California landscape, which narrowly missed inclusion on The Heat Warps.

Commenting on the track frontman Jack Cooper says: “I wrote the words to this song when I was looking out the window driving through Northern California in 2024. For about an hour of the drive Mount Shasta loomed in the distance. Obscured by silhouettes of pine, mist and steamy van windows. It looked like Mount Doom. A lot of The Heat Warps words were written whilst looking out of a van window. Shasta didn't quite make the record. At the time I felt it didn't quite fit and changed the flow of the album. Important things! In the intervening months, I've revisited it and seen something in it that I didn't at the time. It's on a flexi-disc that came with a special edition of the album, but I wanted everyone to hear it. So to coincide with our West Coast shows that begin a stone’s throw from Shasta in Arcata...here it is.”

Modern Nature US Tour:

12/10/25: Arcata, CA @ The Miniplex

12/12/25: Seattle, WA @ Clock Out Lounge

12/13/25: Portland, OR @ Holocene

12/14/25: Point Reyes, CA @ Dance Palace

12/15/25: San Francisco, CA @ 4 Star Theater

12/17/25: Los Angeles, CA @ Gold Diggers

12/18/25: Los Angeles, CA @ Gold Diggers

1/13/26: Boston, MA @ The Rockwell

1/14/26: Montreal, QC @ Casa Del Popolo

1/15/26: Toronto, ON @ Monarch Tavern

1/16/26: Detroit, MI @ Moodor Cafe

1/17/26: Chicago, IL @ Constellation

1/19/26: Atlanta, GA @ The Earl

1/20/26: Asheville, NC @ Ayurprana Listening Room

1/21/26: Durham, NC @ Perfect Lovers

1/22/26: Washington, DC @ DC9

1/23/26: Philadelphia, PA @ Milkboy

1/24/26: Brooklyn, NY @ Union Pool

When Modern Nature toured their last album, 2023’s No Fixed Point In Space, it became apparent to Jack Cooper – the band’s main creative force – that they were already pulling away from the free, open-ended approach they had spent five years working towards; almost as if the music had become so abstract and elasticated, it now had to snap back towards something more structured. As they found themselves naturally locking into more fixed grooves, he realised a new direction had been set. Their new album – The Heat Warps – is the triumphant manifestation of where that new direction took them.

In the aftermath, Cooper’s songwriting, which had become increasingly impressionistic, found a new focus and the idea of making an album that followed a similar path to the last two increasingly seemed somewhat obtuse. The purpose was to forge a radical change. The core trio of him, Jim Wallis (drums) and Jeff Tobias (bass guitar) were augmented by a new guitarist – Tara Cunningham.

Modern Nature’s recent records have reflected an insular life. Cooper had moved out to the countryside in 2021 and had, in his words, been “hibernating” while he started a family. He felt this new band was a symbol for his reawakening and the perfect vessel for him to continue to explore themes that he’s sung about with Modern Nature – collectivism, our relationship with the natural world, the weight of consciousness – but with more directness and purpose. The key was the new dual guitar sound.

In the time Modern Nature has been a band, the world has undoubtedly changed. The words Cooper had been writing previously were somewhat ambiguous but it had started to feel like he was sitting on the fence and that was something he needed to address.

“The community we’ve built our life around – artists, musicians and the people who gravitate to these things as way of communicating – are struggling to reconcile how they fit into an increasingly cruel world. This album, the themes and the lyrics are directed towards them because I think there are still reasons to be optimistic. There are amazing things happening all around us and it’s up to communities like ours to double down on the things we believe in. It feels as if being part of a group like Modern Nature and making an album that’s open, optimistic and ambitious is in itself part of the solution.”