Willis Earl Beal has announced his second album for Hot Charity / XL, Nobody Knows.

The follow-up to last year’s Acousmatic Sorcery – an album that, interestingly, Beal doesn’t seem to actually like much – it was “recorded everywhere and nowhere”, and comes produced by Beal under the pseudonym “Nobody”. Hailing from Chicago and obsessed with Tom Waits, Beal cut his teeth self-releasing CD-Rs and offering to sing for people down the phone (he also appeared on X Factor) before being picked up by XL sub-label Hot Charity, who signed him to a four album deal.

In a press release sent out today, XL claim that Acousmatic Sorcery “worked as a raw, no-fi introduction to Beal’s life as a songwriter and true outsider artist from Chicago, IL, but did little to display the power and natural beauty of the voice he used onstage”, emphasising that Nobody Knows focuses on delivering the promise of his powerful live show.

You can stream a new from it, ‘Everything Unwinds’ below; Nobody Knows will be released on September 9.