Arcade Fire have fuelled speculation of new music with an announcement due today (April 4) heralded with the name ‘Circle Of Trust’.
- READ MORE: Arcade Fire’s ‘Funeral’ at 15: the album that killed indie rock as we knew it
Last month (March 6), the Canadian indie rock band got fans talking when they made some drastic changes to their social media pages – on Instagram, this included wiping all of their posts and uploading a new profile picture, bio and website link.
Since then, it has included a bio with the cryptic message “It’s the year of the snake so let your heart break”, along with a profile picture with the word “TRUST” in all-caps written in a circle. Back in 2022, the band removed all of their Instagram posts and changed the artwork on the page in the lead-up to them announcing their sixth studio album ‘WE’.
Today, the band shared a video which shows an unseen person finger-painting “TRUST” on the back of a tambourine – accompanied by a caption that points to an announcement at 5pm Central Time (11pm UK time). “See you at 5pm central in the Circle of Trust”, it reads.
In March, upon the Instagram profile revamp, eagle-eyed fans noticed the number of posts shared by the band on Stories as well, with many taking to social media to speculate what could be in the works. These stories have included images of the band members, fans, nature and more, all with the same luminous pink tint as seen in the artwork.
“I’m trying to figure out what I’m looking at,” one fan wrote on Reddit, while another added: “This is Win as he was dressed yesterday. If they just shot a music video, we won’t get to see it in the next few days”.
“Circle Of Trust, 99 per cent sure that’s the album name. So excited,” a third shared, while someone else chimed in: “It would be cool if they did a full album drop this time around. I can’t imagine they expect anything but negativity in the media surrounding new singles and an upcoming album. A surprise release seems like something a bit different from them.”
This isn’t the first time in 2025 that the band have been getting fans talking, leading to speculation about a new campaign rollout.
Towards the start of the year frontman Win Butler teamed up with David Byrne and St. Vincent for a rendition of David Bowie‘s ‘Heroes’ during the 50th-anniversary celebrations of Saturday Night Live. The band also announced a one-off show at High Water in South Carolina, taking place next month.
As well as that, last spring saw Butler, Régine Chassagne, Richard Reed Parry, Tim Kingsbury and Jeremy Gara announce a handful of shows to celebrate the 20th-anniversary of their 2004 album ‘Funeral’.
If the new teasers online do turn out to be a new album from Arcade Fire, it’ll mark their first since 2022’s ‘WE’.
It will also be their first new record since allegations of sexual misconduct arose against frontman Win Butler. Four people came forward to accuse the singer of inappropriate behaviour, and the accusations also led to Feist leaving the ‘WE’ tour early.
Butler replied to the allegations in a lengthy statement of his own, claiming he was “very sorry to anyone who I have hurt with my behaviour” but maintaining that “these relationships were all consensual”.
