Ryan Hemsworth announces new album "Numbskull"

Canadian producer and DJ Ryan Hemsworth announced a new album, "Numbskull," due October 21 via Topshelf Records, alongside a new FADER Mix, his first for the outlet since 2013. That earlier mix arrived during his early rise from a low-key life in Ottawa to SoundCloud-era notoriety, when The FADER once called him "maybe North America's fastest rising remixer."

Since then, Hemsworth has produced for artists including Tinashe, Mitski and Alex G, and released several solo and collaborative albums, before slowing down in recent years following the birth of his first child. "Numbskull" marks a return to the guitar music he grew up on, blending his breakbeat dance production with tracks like "Never Learned," a pop-punk thrasher featuring Tegan and Sara.

The new FADER Mix reflects that same range, weaving together his own remix of a Jimmy Eat World song, Pittsburgh band feeble little horse, Harlem rapper Liim, Playboi Carti and the 90s and early-2000s band Life Without Buildings. Hemsworth said revisiting his mashup style, pairing things like an anime sample with a rap acappella, felt overdue, joking that those combinations now count as "real music."

Hemsworth said the shift traces back to burning out on nonstop DJ gigs by 2019, then using the time around his first child's birth and the pandemic to step back, scrap an album he had been working on, and start over. Joining musician Gia Marget's band, he said, helped rebuild his confidence to put out a solo record again after eight years.

"Numbskull" lands in the release calendar among the rest of October's new electronic releases from Ryan Hemsworth.