AKMU returns with their first full-length studio album in seven years since 2019. Through this long voyage, the duo has discovered their individual strengths and tastes, which they now bring into full bloom with their fourth album, FLOWERING.
This album features a collection of 11 tracks, including the title song “Joy, Sorrow, Beautiful Heart”—a piece that leaves a gentle yet profound lingering impression—and other stories that interpret the sunlight and shadows encountered in everyday life through AKMU’s unique perspective.
The song “Joy, Sorrow, Beautiful Heart” embraces the idea that joy and sorrow are not opposites but natural companions — that a heart capable of feeling both is a beautiful one, and rather than pushing sadness away, we should hold it close, because it transforms into something precious.
It uses imagery of sunlight and shadow, cloudy and clear days, to say that no single emotional state defines us — all of our varied experiences, even the cold and lonely nights, are puzzle pieces that eventually fit together into a complete and radiant picture.
Ultimately, the song suggests that the harmony between your laughter and your tears is the most valuable thing there is, and that a life containing both grief and love is not something to fear, but something to sit with and treasure.
They hope that everyone who has grown alongside AKMU will joyfully welcome FLOWERING—a “paradise” that is no longer solitary, but rather created together with the colleagues who have gathered by their side along the way.
Listen to the full album with a visualizer.
