Photo Credit: Peggy Sirota

Elton John and Brandi Carlile have officially announced Who Believes In Angels?, a new full-length shared album. Due to release on April 4 via Interscope Records, the powerhouse duo’s new offering is a truly collaborative endeavor, featuring significant contributions from longtime collaborators Bernie Taupin and Andrew Watt. To preview the project, the artists have shared the title track and a trailer cut from intimate behind the scenes footage.

Who Believes in Angels? was initially conceived by Elton, Brandi and Watt as an opportunity to expand both artists’ sonic palettes through close collaboration, balancing songs led by each and composed together in the studio. In October 2023, the team set up at Los Angeles’ Sunset Sound Studios with nothing prepared and dared to cut an album completely from scratch in 20 days. With lyrics from Taupin and Carlile, production and creative mediation from Watt and instrumental accompaniment from a tremendous band of Chad Smith, Pino Palladino and Josh Kilnghoffer, the ensemble pushed each other out of their comfort zones and crafted a project as personally transformative as it is sonically inventive.

“This record was one of the toughest I’ve ever made, but it was also one of the greatest musical experiences of my life,” Elton attests. “It has given me a place where I know I can move forward. Who Believes In Angels? feels like going into another era and I’m pushing the door open to come into the future. I have everything I’ve done behind me and it’s been brilliant, amazing. But this is the new start for me. As far as I’m concerned, this is the start of my career Mark two.”

“I’m still reeling from the fact that I got to do it,” Carlile reflects. “I think all ships rise with Elton John’s standards for songwriting, and it was an incredibly challenging and inspiring environment to work in, everybody throwing in ideas, everybody listening to everybody else’s ideas. It felt like a family. The world is a wild place to live in right now. It’s hard to find peace and triumph. It’s a radical act to seek out joyful and euphoric happenings. And that is what this album represents to me.”

The bold, tumultuous and ultimately revelatory process that gave rise to the album is documented in the trailer, which cuts thousands of hours of video recorded by static cameras around the studio into a stirring three-minute synopsis. In passing glances, all the artists involved can be seen pouring their spirits into the work, dropping their guard and embracing an intense emotional experience. The fruit of this process can be heard on the deeply affecting title track, which steers Elton and Brandi into enticing new sonic territory that grows naturally from their acclaimed discographies to bloom as something brand new. Watch the album trailer and listen to the lead single below.

Who Believes in Angels is available to pre-order now; fans who pre-order the project will receive early access to tickets for ‘An Evening With Elton John & Brandi Carlile,’ which will join the icons onstage at The London Palladium on March 26.

Read on for the album’s complete tracklist.

Who Believes In Angels? – Elton John & Brandi Carlile
The Rose Of Laura Nyro
Little Richard’s Bible
Swing For The Fences
Never Too Late
You Without Me
Who Believes In Angels?
The River Man
A Little Light
Someone To Belong To
When This Old World Is Done With Me