On 25 March 2026, Lettie will release Pirate Lover, a new nine-track album that continues the path of one of the UK’s most distinctive independent artists. The record was largely made in her own home and reflects a practical reality familiar to many musicians, having been recorded in spare hours between other responsibilities. It is being presented as a dreamy and nostalgic work, with “Private Lover” accompanying the campaign around the release.
What sets the album apart is the contrast between its gentle musical frame and the weight of the experiences behind it. The material reaches into family history and personal upheaval, including a near-death experience, a family gambling addiction and the loss of a familiar landscape through industrial development. At the same time, the songs carry the presence of new love, inspired in part by a relationship with an ex-racing car driver.
Lettie approached the album with a strong sense of purpose. A decisive moment came when she discovered that her dentist had built up thousands of Spotify streams with AI-created music despite not being a musician in the usual sense. Rather than follow that route, she turned to the values she has always trusted: songwriting, live musicianship and the sound of real instruments played by real people. Influenced by Molly Drake and early Blues artists, she began with acoustic guitar at her kitchen table and enlisted musicians including Dave Barbarossa, while Cameron Craig’s mix supplied the album’s principal layer of studio finishing.
That commitment to performance has defined Lettie’s career for years. She has built a reputation for live shows without backing tracks, sometimes looping keyboard parts and playing multiple instruments at once, and once impressed Gina Birch of The Raincoats by attempting to play keyboard with her big toe while singing and playing electric guitar. From her early New York recordings with David Baron to BBC support, Glastonbury, European dates with Peter Murphy and collaborations with Anthony Phillips, Lettie has consistently followed her own route. With Pirate Lover, she appears to be extending that same independent spirit into a new and deeply personal set of songs.