Sara Bareilles Announces First Album in Seven Years Good Grief

GRAMMY-winning singer-songwriter Sara Bareilles has announced her highly anticipated seventh studio album, Good Grief, arriving 28 August via Epic Records. Marking her first album since the acclaimed, GRAMMY-winning Amidst the Chaos in 2019, Good Grief opens a powerful new chapter in Bareilles’ two-decade career. Alongside the announcement, she has shared the album’s first single “Home” — a moving introduction to a 14-track collection that explores loss, healing and the search for hope in difficult times.

“Home” was inspired by a conversation between Stephen Colbert and Anderson Cooper about grief and loss, with Bareilles describing the track as an invitation into the emotional world of the record. “My deepest hope is that Good Grief provides some kind of comfort or catharsis,” she says.

Written from a place of personal reflection, Good Grief finds Bareilles transforming experiences of loss into songs of connection, resilience and renewal. The album moves between intimate tributes to those she has lost, powerful statements on women’s rights and moments of unexpected joy found within life’s hardest chapters.

Produced by Bareilles herself, the record was largely created over six days at Dreamland Recording Studios in Woodstock, New York, alongside a group of longtime collaborators including drummer Charley Drayton, guitarist Butterfly Boucher, keyboardist Misty Boyce, bassist Solomon Dorsey, multi-instrumentalist Rob Moose and co-producer Jonathan Low. Further sessions took place with Aaron Dessner at Long Pond Studios, with additional contributions from Brandi Carlile, Andrea Gibson, Ingrid Michaelson, Joe Tippett and Megan Falley.

The making of the album is documented in the new film Sara Bareilles: Good Grief, which premieres at Tribeca Festival this week. The documentary captures Bareilles’ return to the studio with close friends for the first time in seven years, offering an intimate look at creativity, collaboration and the healing power of music.

The album arrives during a landmark period for Bareilles, whose recent work includes “Salt Then Sour Then Sweet”, co-written with Brandi Carlile and the late poet and activist Andrea Gibson, which features in the Peabody Award-winning documentary Come See Me in the Good Light. The track also appears on Good Grief.

A multi-award-winning artist, Bareilles has sold more than three million albums and 15 million singles in the US, while earning over 3.5 billion streams worldwide. Beyond music, she has found success across Broadway, television and film, including creating the Tony-nominated musical Waitress, starring in Girls5eva, and earning Emmy nominations for her performance in Jesus Christ Superstar Live!.

With Good Grief, Sara Bareilles returns with a deeply personal collection that transforms heartbreak into hope — proving once again the extraordinary emotional power of her songwriting.