Listen: Perfume Genius – ‘Natural High’

Mike Hadreas (Perfume Genius) and choreographer Kate Wallich have reunited for a new evening-length music and dance work, The Lesson, commissioned by Seattle Theatre Group. Blending Perfume Genius’ emotionally charged experimental pop with Wallich’s distinctive choreographic language, The Lesson is a raw, live music and dance performance that draws inspiration from The Piano Teacher, the notorious novel by Elfriede Jelinek that was later adapted into Michael Haneke’s celebrated film.

They will premiere The Lesson at REDCAT in Los Angeles with a three-night stand beginning February 18, followed by additional performances February 25-27. In March The Lesson will continue its world tour with performances in New York City, Paris, London, and more.

The score features all new Perfume Genius music, and more is expected to be released in 2027. Today, he offers an early listen via ‘Natural High’, which marks his first release since his acclaimed GRAMMY-nominated seventh album, Glory. Co-produced by Pascal Stevenson (Fashion Club), the six-minute song ascends from moody keyboard figures to gauzy synths and culminates in a full-on house rave-up.

Perfume Genius brings his acclaimed ‘Duo Tour’ to the UK for two exclusive performances on October 27th and October 28th (sold out) at Union Chapel in London. The intimate run of shows features Hadreas and longtime collaborator, keyboardist, and co-writer Alan Wyffels performing songs from across Perfume Genius’ celebrated catalogue.

The Lesson follows Hadreas and Wallich’s acclaimed 2019 collaboration The Sun Still Burns Here, and its afterlife, Perfume Genius’ celebrated album Ugly Season.  The new work examines what happens when desire has nowhere to go, and what we are rehearsing when we practice “good behavior.” Moving through repression, longing, authority, and submission, it unfolds through unstable scenes where roles shift, boundaries blur, and the unsaid becomes manically physical.

Longtime admirers of Perfume Genius will recognise the influence of The Piano Teacher, a work Hadreas has often cited as a touchstone. Its intense psychological landscape, unsettling humor, and capacity to hold tragedy and absurdity simultaneously resonate throughout The Lesson.

Created and performed by Hadreas, Wallich, Alan Wyffels, and Tate Justus, The Lesson continues an ongoing artistic dialogue between music, movement, and performance. The work brings together longtime collaborators and expands upon the creative partnership first explored in The Sun Still Burns Here, which was hailed by critics as “an otherworldly collaboration” (The Stranger) and prompted Pitchfork to declare, “This might be how the music of Perfume Genius is meant to be experienced.”

“Mike and I learned during the last piece, that we are interested in the same kinds of tensions and contradictions in the work we make“, says Wallich. “When we started searching for a framework for this new piece, we kept coming back to The Piano Teacher. We are all drawn to the dynamics between what is good and what is bad…how we’re supposed to behave, and how we aren’t, how to balance desire and restraint. As we’ve gotten older and closer, and learned a lot of our own lessons along the way, it feels right to come back into a room together, ask new questions and create stakes together again.”

Stream / download ‘Natural High’ here.