Nick Ward returns with “Making Time,” the opening track from his forthcoming sophomore album Year Of The Snake, out November 13 via EMI Music Australia. Listen here.

The song was the first Ward made  with co-producer Timon Martin, and became a turning point in the making of the record, with Ward discovering a new way of working after largely making his acclaimed 2024 debut House With The Blue Door himself.

“Realising that I could hand over the control a little bit and collaborate a bit more was great – I realised I wasn’t going to have to sacrifice anything by working with other people,” says Ward. “I play most of the instruments on the record and it’s still my baby at the end of the day, but I wanted to share the workload a little bit as well after getting so heady while finishing House With The Blue Door.”

That sense of possibility runs through “Making Time”. Written during a period when Ward’s long-term relationship and friendships were beginning to unravel, the song became a kind of imagined escape – a fantasy of what might exist on the other side of everything falling apart.

“I was writing during a time when I was stuck in this relationship and stuck in these friendships, dreaming of escape,” Ward says. “A lot of the songs were written almost as fantasy, and then ended up happening.”

That tension between fantasy and reality sits at the heart of Year Of The Snake. Following House With The Blue Door, Ward’s forthcoming album is a more expansive and collaborative record, moving between folk, baroque-pop, electronic music, soul, indie-rock and classical music.

Inspired by the melancholy sunshine of Brian Wilson, Vampire Weekend’s baroque mementos mori and the psychedelic pop of Animal Collective, Year Of The Snake is ultimately a record about growing up – losing people, losing certainty, and figuring out who you are when the life you thought you were building begins to change.

Alongside Nielson and Martin, Ward worked with Lucian Rice and Tony Buchen, among others, while continuing to play most of the instruments across the album.

“With this album, I wanted to make something that had a few more mistakes” he says. “I wanted to attack the feelings of things – to get to the truth in a different way.”

Ward will also preview material from Year Of The Snake at a free live show at Chateau Wah Wah in St Peters on October 24, ahead of the album’s November 13 release.