Ellie Goulding has delayed the release of her fifth studio album.
The pop star was due to release the follow-up to 2020's 'Brightest Blue', 'Higher Than Heaven', on February 3, however, fans will now have to wait until March 24.
The 'Lights' singer explained that she's been forced to push the LP back slightly due to "some exciting opportunities", which she'll "share" with fans "in due course".
However, she did tease the new single 'Like a Saviour', which is "coming soon", and follows 'Easy Lover', 'All by Myself' and 'Let It Die'.
She began the Instagram post: "To my incredible fans- I’m sorry to announce that we’re delaying the release of Higher Than Heaven to March 24. I know you’ve all been so patient with me but we’ve had some exciting opportunities appear behind the scenes which I cannot wait to share with you in due course. In the meantime as a thank you for your patience , I'm excited to confirm that my new single is called Like A Saviour. It’s coming soon , we’ve shot the video and it’s one of my favourite videos I’ve ever done. And as a small thank you for bearing with me I wanted to give you a first look at it. We also shot something really exciting this past weekend that’ll come around the album’s release. More on that very soon…"
Revealing the new release date, she continued: "Thank you all so much for sticking by me. I can’t wait to finally share this record with you all on March 24 and I hope you love it as much as I do."
Ellie signed off the post: "Sending you love and warmth as always, Ellie x."
The 36-year-old star ditched ballads on her upcoming record.
Ellie's hit love songs include 'Still Falling For You' from the 'Bridget Jones's Baby' soundtrack and 'Love Me Like You Do from the erotic rom-com 'Fifty Shades of Grey'.
However, the 'Burn' hitmaker noticed a shift in people's music tastes post-pandemic, with most favouring upbeat dance tunes - so fans can expect just that 'Higher Than Heaven'.
She said: "No-one seems to be into ballads at the moment post-pandemic.
“People want to make music to move to. That’s basically what my new album sounds like.”
The 'I Need Your Love' hitmaker recently said of her return to her electronic dance-pop roots: “I spent a lot of time by myself, quite introspective. I had a backlog of things I wanted to write about.
"It was quite deep and emotional. And this album is the opposite of that. I found this dream team of writers, who just for some reason, without even having to talk about it, were all on the same page. Together we’re on this mission just to have fun. We just want to make music for people to dance to and forget about everything in the past year."
