The Afghan Whigs - Soft Control

Soft Control is the Afghan Whigs' tenth studio album and the first they have made as a band with nothing left to prove and no interest in acting like it. Released in August 2026, it runs ten songs and under forty minutes, which for a group prone to sprawl reads as a deliberate act of discipline.

Greg Dulli wrote everything here and produced alongside Christopher Thorn, splitting sessions between Fireside Sound, Marigny Recording Studio in New Orleans and Gold-Diggers Sound in Los Angeles. That geography shows. "Jungle Roux" opens on a humid, horn-shadowed groove, "Memphis, Texas" plays the band's two spiritual home towns against each other, and "A Simulation" closes the record at six minutes of slow dissolve. Petra Haden and Bo Koster turn up throughout, and Rex Gregory's arrangements give the back half a width the guitars alone never had.

John Webber mastered at Air Studios in London and Jeff Powell cut the vinyl, which is the same pairing that has served this band well since Gentlemen. The result is warm and unhurried where the last few records were tense.

Standard black vinyl in an embossed gatefold sleeve with a printed card inner. Pressed at GZ Media for Royal Cream Records.