TOPS shares new single + new album 'Bury The Key' due 8/22

TOPS SHARES NEW SINGLE “ANNIHILATION”  NEW ALBUM BURY THE KEY DUE AUGUST 22ND VIA GHOSTLY INTERNATIONAL

TOPS by Aabid Youssef “Montreal indie pop institution” EXCLAIM!  “The band's soft-rock jangle beckon[s] us to get with the times no matter what side of the generation line you fall on.” NPR “Near-perfect songwriting” Pitchfork “Sophisticated production, nostalgic synths and gorgeous tunes” The Guardian “Insanely addictive” DIY Magazine “Annihilation”  LISTEN: https://ghostly.lnk.to/TOPS-Annihilation  WATCH: https://youtu.be/K8JUH7w6-qY Bury The Key  PRE-SAVE/ORDER: https://ghostly.lnk.to/TOPS-Bury-the-Key  (July 23, 2025) - Montréal band TOPS shares “Annihilation,” the latest single from their forthcoming album Bury The Key due August 22nd via Ghostly International. The song arrives alongside a lyric visualizer.  Born of a different process than most TOPS songs, "Annihilation" started with a drum part from Riley Fleck before the rest of the band wrote to it, the result is a fill-heavy song that is lyrically inspired navigating a world on the edge of collapse. Speaking about the song, the band shares:  “It’s easy to fear the future but in the end nothing is ever finished and you just gotta follow your heart. It’s like a mix of complacency and surrendering. As we were working on it a lot of cultural ‘greats’ were passing away. People like Sinead O’Connor and Ryuichi Sakamoto have been incredibly influential on our music and it’s sad to think that they’re on their way to being forgotten. We added a part that’s meant to be a wink to 'Behind the Mask' by YMO." TOPS — musicians Jane Penny, David Carriere, Marta Cikojevic and Riley Fleck — write timeless music that reliably threads immediacy and depth. Bury the Key, their first full-length since 2020 and with new label home Ghostly International, is a captivating reintroduction for the Montréal band: ever refined, undoubtedly masters of their melodic craft yet unafraid of evolving and testing themselves against different, at times darker tones. Bury The Key faces feelings once locked away, engaging the give-and-take between happiness, hedonism, and self-destruction. While often inhabited by fictional figures, their glowing, grooving, self-produced songs draw from personal observations: intimacy (both inside and outside the band), toxic behavior, drug use, and apocalyptic dread. When recording started, they noticed a shift and leaned in, jokingly dubbed "evil TOPS," says Penny. "We're always kind of seen as a soft band or like naive or friendly in a Canadian way, but we made it a challenge to really channel the world around us." Through the lens of a looming epoch and the clarity that comes with age, TOPS dip into a more sinister disco realm with Bury the Key, giving their soft-focus sophisti-pop a sharpened edge.   Emerging from Montréal's DIY scene in the early 2010s as progenitors of an indie pop sound still radiating its influence across the contemporary landscape, TOPS’ secret to longevity is simple: keep the songwriting honest and open-hearted and the recording unforced yet pristine, allowing for a band dynamic deeply attuned at every level. Their songs outline the silhouettes of life, and as time goes on — now five LPs, countless tours, and various side projects in — TOPS have only gotten better at what they do.    The voice of TOPS is Jane Penny, a songwriter, producer, flutist, and singer whose hushed delivery hosts a deceivingly vast range of expression and has surely informed a wave of today's greats from Men I Trust to Clairo. Her lyrical subjects never go out of style: dynamics of power, desire, struggles to be seen, having love requited or otherwise. Following her move back to Montréal and first solo release in 2024, Penny returns to the neighbourhoods of her former self a step wiser; the sleek cars and forever highways of her songs, penned with her rhythmic counterpart David Carriere, find assured depth in Bury the Key. Carriere, a songwriter, producer, and guitarist with a flair for high-sheen hooks and the relentless drive to match (other projects include DVC Refreshments and Born At Midnite), adds to his bag of tonal and textural tricks. Drummer Riley Fleck, the band's heartbeat since day one and occasional gun for others (Jessica Pratt's live band as of late), broadens his utility, venturing into higher and harder tempos. Keyboardist Marta Cikojevic, who joined TOPS in 2017 just before the landmark I Feel Alive and in 2022 released her breakout debut as Marci (produced by Carriere), expands her role here as well, joining the writing process and backing Penny for some of the record's fullest, most satisfying vocal lines.   It is rare to see a band so aligned and complete, self-sufficient, specialized yet agile and ambitious, reaching an elite level of pop precision as their legacy remains largely unwritten. They've toured the world over, from major festivals to the dingiest of dives, sleeping on floors and tour-managing themselves for years, manifesting their success the hard way. Beyond work ethic, it also comes down to chemistry and taste; when pressed for which artists get airplay in their van, some expected names appear, Fleetwood Mac and Steely Dan, but dig deeper and the veneer of artists like China Crisis, Prefab Sprout, and Francois Hardy, Missing Persons, and Everything But the Girl start to fill out the playlist. An instinct for luster and thrills, songs both sweet and bleak, brings the band to Bury the Key, a prismatic album polished out of the rough. Grounded by pain and pleasure, the complicated joys of being alive, of being a band from one of our era's finest. Pre-save/order Bury the Key, listen to "Annihilation" above and find full tour and album details below.

Bury The Key official tour poster Upcoming Live Shows TICKETS 9/4 – Vancouver, BC @ Vogue Theatre 9/5 – Portland, OR @ Wonder Ballroom 9/6 – Seattle, WA @ The Crocodile (EARLY SHOW) 9/8 – Salt Lake City, UT @ Urban Lounge 9/9 – Denver, CO @ Bluebird Theater 9/11 – Dallas, TX @ Club Dada - Outdoor Stage 9/12 – Houston, TX @ Heights Theater 9/14 – El Paso, TX @ Lowbrow Palace 9/15 – Tucson, AZ @ Club Congress 9/17 – Phoenix, AZ @ The Crescent Ballroom 9/18 – San Diego, CA @ Belly Up 9/19 – San Francisco, CA @ The Fillmore 9/20 – Los Angeles, CA @ The Bellwether 10/1 – New York, NY @ Webster Hall 10/2 – Boston, MA @ The Sinclair 10/3 – Philadelphia, PA @ Underground Arts 10/4 – Washington, DC @ Union Stage 10/6 – Durham, NC @ Motorco Music Hall 10/7 – Asheville, NC @ The Grey Eagle Tavern & Music Hall 10/8 – Atlanta, GA @ Terminal West 10/9 – Nashville, TN @ Exit/In 10/11 – Austin, TX @ Austin City Limits Festival 10/14 – Chicago, IL @ Thalia Hall 10/16 – Detroit, MI @ El Club 10/17 – Toronto, ON @ Phoenix Concert Theatre 10/18 – Montreal, QC @ Théâtre Beanfield 11/10 – Brighton, UK @ Patterns 11/11 – London, UK @ Heaven 11/13 – Dublin, IE @ Workmans Club 11/14 – Glasgow, UK @ Stereo 11/15 – Manchester, UK @ Band on the Wall 11/17 – Leeds, UK @ The Brudenell Social Club 11/18 – Bristol, UK @ Rough Trade 11/10 – Brighton, UK @ Patterns 11/11 – London, UK @ Heaven 11/13 – Dublin, IE @ Workmans Club 11/14 – Glasgow, UK @ Stereo 11/15 – Manchester, UK @ Band on the Wall 11/17 – Leeds, UK @ The Brudenell Social Club 11/18 – Bristol, UK @ Rough Trade 11/20 – Kortrijk, BE @ Wilde Westen 11/21 – Paris, FR @ Point Ephemere 11/22 – Brussels, BE @ Botanique 11/23 – Vlaardingen, NL @ De Kroepoekfabriek 11/24 – Hamburg, DE @ Nochtspeicher 11/26 – Berlin, DE @ Neue Zukunft

Bury the Key album artwork TOPS Bury the Key Ghostly International August 22nd, 2025 1. Stars Come After You 2. Wheels at Night 3. ICU2 4. Outstanding in the Rain 5. Annihilation 6. Falling on my Sword 7. Call You Back 8. Chlorine 9. Mean Streak 10. Your Ride 11. Standing at the Edge of Fire 12. Paper House Connect with TOPS: Instagram | TikTok | X | YouTube