Ryan Gosling is bringing one of his spookiest side projects back from the dead. Dead Man’s Bones, the rock duo he formed with musician Zach Shields, will release new music on October 27, marking the pair’s first new songs in 17 years.
The band announced the news Thursday with a creepy teaser on Instagram, complete with a haunting voice reciting a poem about ghosts waiting to return to the world. The message ends with a promise that something will change on October 27, before a young voice calls out the release date. The video keeps the details under wraps. But its spooky imagery fits right in with the duo’s Halloween-ready sound.
Gosling and Shields released their self-titled debut album in 2009, recording with the Silverlake Conservatory Children’s Choir. Their music leaned into a very gothic atmosphere, making Dead Man’s Bones a rather different outlet for Gosling than his work on the big screen. Until this week’s announcement, that original album remained the duo’s only full-length release. This might just be Kenough to send fans of the band into an absolute tizzy.
Gosling’s wife Eva Mendes had been teasing the return on social media before the official announcement. She first posted that she was “Trying to summon new music from Dead Man’s Bones,” then celebrated the news with the message, “He came through on his promise to me.”
Gosling has hardly kept his musical side hidden over the years. He sang alongside Emma Stone in La La Land, then took on the plastic boy anthem “I’m Just Ken” for Barbie. The latter earned him a Grammy nomination. He performed it live at the 2024 Academy Awards in one of the ceremony’s biggest musical moments.
Now, just days before Halloween, Gosling and Shields are returning to the ghostly project they started nearly two decades ago. We’ll find out exactly what Dead Man’s Bones has been cooking up when the new music arrives October 27.
