Tift Merritt Searches For “Someone To Watch The Band With Me” On New Single

 LISTEN HERE

First Album In A Decade, Sugar

Out June 26 Via One Riot

"[Sugar] is every bit as tender and tough-minded as what you would expect from the woman who brought you classic records like 'Tambourine,' but possibly even more joyful... Bracingly real and ebullient."

- Variety

 

April 24, 2026: Today, beloved Grammy-nominated singer-songwriter Tift Merritt has shared her new single “Someone To Watch The Band With Me,”previewing her first album in a decade, Sugar, due out June 26 via One Riot. The track examines lingering loneliness in a modern, increasingly online world and epitomizes the profound honesty that radiates throughout Sugar.

“There’s something really lonely about the digital world when you can get anything you want delivered but finding real human connection seems fraught,” says Merritt about the new single. “I’m fifty, I have three jobs, a kid, no time; how am I going to find someone? I just wanted to say really directly, something that might cut through the noise, a signal flare. We make everything else so easy to find, why does love remain elusive?”

Listen to “Someone To Watch The Band With Me” HERE.

Watch the “Someone To Watch The Band With Me” music video HERE.

Merritt’s upcoming album marks a defining new chapter for the North Carolina-bred artist long regarded as one of Americana’s most influential voices. She stepped largely out of the spotlight following her 2017 album Stitch of the World, turning her focus toward raising her daughter, serving as a Practitioner-in-Residence at Duke University, helping shape the hotel reinvention of The Gables in Raleigh, NC, and advocating for musician rights through the Artist Rights Alliance. That time away - lived fully and on her own terms – quietly expanded her sense of purpose, laying the foundation for the songs that would become Sugar.

A gorgeously unguarded collection rooted in Merritt’s radiant blend of country-soul, Sugar was written across eight years of lived experience and reveals an artist returning with renewed clarity and emotional depth. Moving fluidly between the intimate and the expansive, the album finds Merritt celebrating fleeting moments of grace while grounding her songs in the realities of everyday life. Listen to the lead single “Finest Feelings” HERE and watch a BTS video from the making of the album HERE.

Now more than two decades into her career, Merritt remains a singular voice in American music, returning with a record rooted in hard-won perspective, creative renewal, and the sustaining power of honesty and love. “My work has always been about trying to understand what it means to be human at that point in time; I believe it’s my responsibility as an artist to have a creative response to the current moment,” says Merritt. “But that response has to make room for the personal and the joyful too—we can’t face everything with doom and gloom alone.”

Recorded at Nashville’s Gold Pacific Studios and tracked live, Sugar captures a deliberate spontaneity that underscores the emotional immediacy of Merritt’s performances. Produced by Lawrence Rothman, she’s joined by a wide-ranging group of collaborators, including guitarist Audley Freed (Alison Krauss, Sheryl Crow), multi-instrumentalist Robert Ellis (PJ Harvey, Faye Webster), Dr. Dog’s Eric Slick, Midlake’s McKenzie Smith, and Memphis-based arranger Art Edmaiston.

Merritt recently sat down with Variety’s Chris Willman for the first in-depth interview ahead of the new album. You can read the exclusive HERE.

Sugar Album Artwork

Hailed by The New Yorker as “the bearer of a proud tradition of distaff country soul,” Merritt first broke through with her 2004 album Tambourine, which earned a Grammy nomination for Best Country Album. Her songwriting has drawn comparisons to Joni Mitchell and Emmylou Harris, and she has collaborated with artists including Jason Isbell and Iron & Wine.

In addition to the album, Merritt is also a part of the revisioning of The Gables, a 18-room hotel, bar and gathering space in Raleigh, NC, set to open this July. For more information, please visit https://www.thegablesraleigh.com/.

Merritt will play Evanston Folk Festival in September, with additional dates to be announced. You can pre-order Sugar (out June 26) HERE and visit https://www.tiftmerritt.com/ for more information and upcoming tour dates.

 

Press Contacts:

Allison Elbl (Shore Fire) - aelbl@shorefire.com 

Taylor Perry (Shore Fire) - tperry@shorefire.com