‘Songs For Other People’s Weddings’: Jens Lekman Details New Album & Tour Dates

Jens Lekman returns with his first solo album in eight years, Songs For Other People’s Weddings, on September 12 via Secretly Canadian. The Swedish singer-songwriter will embark on an extensive North American headlining tour in support of the record, which features lead single, “Candy From A Stranger.”

Songs For Other People’s Weddings is the companion album to a novel of the same name Lekman penned with bestselling author David Levithan, which was inspired by Jens’ time as a wedding singer. The book is scheduled to arrive through Abrams on August 5.

In 2004, Lekman released the song “If You Ever Need A Stranger (To Sing At Your Wedding)” and started to receive invitations from fans who took the title literally. “I wrote the album while the book was still being written and, at some points, I started imagining what happened between the book’s chapters. The book and the album eventually became intertwined but also found their own paths. The book provided the structure of the story, but the album sometimes snuck behind the scenes. Stories from the songs made their way into the book and vice versa,” Lekman explained.

“While this story is very much about a relationship and how it’s reflected through the relationships and weddings of others, most of all I think it’s a love story about music and its value in a time when it’s been devalued and turned into content by tech companies. Its ability to soothe and connect and its role in the transitional moments of our lives such as weddings. It’s a love song to love songs,” Lekman added of the book and album.

Songs For Other People’s Weddings marks Lekman’s fifth proper solo album and first since 2017’s Life Will See You Now. In 2019, Jens paired up with Annika Norlin on the collaborative record Correspondence.

Jens Lekman tapped Rena Johnson to edit footage of him performing at various weddings for the “Candy From A Stranger” video. Check out the visual for the first taste of Songs For Other People’s Weddings below:

The tour kicks off on November 8 in Saint Paul (Minnesota) before heading to Chicago on November 9. Lekman then crosses the border to perform in Toronto on November 10. The November run continues with stops in Cambridge (Massachusetts) on November 12, Northampton (Massachusetts) on November 13 and Philadelphia on November 14.

After performing in Brooklyn on November 16, the tour continues in Washington on November 17, Durham (North Carolina) on November 19, Atlanta on November 21 and Nashville (Tennessee) on November 22. Lekman then heads to Texas for shows in Dallas on November 24 and Austin on November 25. The tour moves west with performances in Phoenix (Arizona) on November 28, Los Angeles on November 29 and San Francisco on November 30.

Jens Lekman’s fall tour concludes with shows in Portland (Oregon) on December 2 and Seattle on December 3. Tickets go on sale this Friday, July 11 at 10 a.m. local time.

Songs For Other People’s Weddings Tracklist

1. The First Lovesong
2. A Tuxedo Sewn For Two
3. Candy From a Stranger
4. Two Little Pigs
5. Speak To Me In Music
6. With You I Can Hear My Own Voice
7. I Want To Want You Again
8. GOT-JFK
9. Wedding In Brooklyn
10. For Skye
11. Increasingly Obsolete
12. On a Pier, On the Hudson
13. Wedding In Leipzig
14. LEJ-GOT
15. You Have One New Message
16. Just For One Moment
17. The Last Lovesong