In an era where top artists can take 10 years between albums (that means you, Bruno), Self is showing that they're ready to follow the trend and come back on the decade line. Last putting out Ornament & Crime in 2017, the sixth studio follow-up, You've Been Tricked, is now on the horizon.
Perhaps most interestingly of all, the album's style will be influenced by fan-submitted tier lists.
This uncommon decision may make it seem as though the album just began it's development phrase, but it's in reality been in the works for quite a few years.
You've Been Tricked is yet another return for Self
Self is no stranger to taking their time between albums. Their fourth album in 2000 had nothing after until the 2014 EP Super Fake Nice, which is the band's newest material; their fifth album in 2017 had been finished long prior. Naturally, their upcoming effort took a comparable amount of years.
Back on May 10th, 2022, leader Matt Mahaffey posted to Instagram that he was recording new music for the first time since 2014. Various studio shots of new microphones and pianos have since been shared through the following years, though by 2024, these updates started coming in the form of audio.
The first snippet we got was of Mahaffey using Pro Tools in VR to emulate a full studio of screens, posted on October 19th. In it, he plays the piano line to an untitled song with vocals, though his screen displays "She Went to Pa-" as a partially obscured file name. To paradise or to Paris? We'll find out in due time.
Self has always kept the fans in mind
In the same month, a cover art was teased through daily Instagram posts. Between the 10th and 14th, five segments of a 3 by 3 grid slowly revealed the title "Love You Less" and a 3D broken heart. This stopped after five, though, as signs of it being an AI-generated image drew heavy criticism.
He humbly deleted these posts and restarted the process on the 27th with hand-drawn artwork by his daughter, which correspondingly received wide approval. It was then dramatically revealed on November 6th to be the cover of a new Self single, which was released the same day as "Love You Less".
The new material didn't end there, however, as Self also featured as "Elfs" on the holiday track "Merry Christmas, Santa." This was part of the album, Christmas in Space, by Cake in Space (Mahaffey's composer collective), which was released on November 29th, 2024.
The buildup of a new era for the band
On the night of March 4th, 2026, a channel in the Self Discord server named "#youve-been-tricked" was silently created, creating confusion and questions of an early April Fools' joke. These were answered on the morning of the 9th, when Matt gave the following announcement:
"Hi! Matt Mahaffey here. 'You've Been Tricked' is my working title for a new sElf album. Fans are very diverse in what previous sElf songs / albums they appreciate, so it's pretty hard to actually know what you guys want." He added, "Perhaps you guys could create 12 song tracklists of your faves from any album or era."
The announcement closed out with "I will be checking this particular [channel] often to see what you guys think and what ideas you might have. Let's go places. Cheers!" The channel in question is publicly accessible through Self's Discord server, where they just might consider how you rank their music.