Nonesuch releases the fifth studio album from the award-winning French singer and composer Camille, OUÏ, in the United States on October 13, 2017. Recorded over the course of a year in La Chartreuse—a fourteenth-century monastery-turned-artist’s residence in Avignon, France—OUÏ was released internationally earlier this year to critical and popular acclaim. Debuting at #1 in the French charts, the album was called "a celebration of a vocal instrument as dexterous as it is delicate, with sounds given new shapes and word play at a premium" by the UK’s Evening Standard. OUÏ was co-produced by Camille with two of her longtime collaborators: composer and multi-instrumentalist Clement Ducol and sound and mixing engineer Maxime Leguil. Mostly sung in French, the album also includes one song in English, "Seeds." That track and "Fontaine de Lait" are available to download now with album pre-orders from iTunes and the Nonesuch Store, which also includes a download of the complete album available starting release day. You can watch the official video for "Fontaine de lait" and hear "Seeds" below. In celebration of the album’s release, Camille performs an intimate show at New York City’s (Le) Poisson Rouge on Monday, October 16; tickets go on sale this Friday, August 11, at 10am, here.

OUÏ features the versatile Moog analogue synthesizer, and percussion is used throughout the album as a sort of bedrock. As Camille says, "The story of the album is like this, moving from the arcane drums to the treble and harmonics and light in my voice. All the voices are telling a story, and I am all the voices."

"It really resonates," says Camille, "On some songs there are no drums, just this sub-bass like a kick drum, which leads the way and gives it a beat."

Though Camille initially set out to write politically charged songs inspired by drum-driven French traditional dances, after reflecting upon her country’s recent tragic events, she was drawn to create something more peaceful—a vowel-oriented and resonant exploration of sound. The album’s title—ooo…eee—came from that playfulness with sounds and language, a breaking free of restrictions.

Becoming a mother for the second time also was an influence: "Having my children made me want to dive again into the spring of life, of love, of sound. All this mothering has led me to an approach of fluidity, I am enthusiastic about the cultural renaissance that is coming up, this going back to earth."

OUÏ also pays tribute to Camille’s father: "My father was a singer and while he didn’t do music for a living he definitely showed me the way. This is the first time he won’t hear a new album of mine, which is maybe why I called it OUÏ—like ‘heard’[the French word for "hearing is "l’ouïe"]. I wanted to make something so resonant, so beautiful, that he can hear it where he is. Music has always helped me communicate on another very subtle level."

Camille is known internationally for her live performances, which run the gamut from cross-art-form happenings in Paris, London, and Sydney to a pared down tour of chapels in the Le Beaujolais region of France.