Ondara (fka J.S. Ondara) has announced his third album, Spanish Villager No: 3, due September 16 via Verve Forecast (pre-order). The album was produced by Ondara and past collaborator Mike Viola (Jenny Lewis, Andrew Bird, etc) with contributions from Taylor Goldsmith and Griffin Goldsmith of Dawes, Sebastian Steinberg, Tim Kuhl and Jeremy Stacey. Of the Spanish Villager character, Ondara says "he formed himself during some of my darkest times, and as he came to life, he carried in his heart all the anxieties I had about my journey and about this new world I had moved to."
He also adds, "I always feel like I’m walking in the dead of night, darkness as my guide, yielding to the subconscious instincts of the muse. Then at some point as the day breaks, I look back and find that the path behind me has outlined something interesting. That is how this project came together, one blind step after another. Collectively, I think of the whole project as one epic poem — a subconscious exploration of the world inside and outside me."