It's been only eight months since Andrew Bird released his last album, Break It Yourself—famously recorded in his West Illinois barn (of course)—and from the sound of his latest EP, Hands of Glory, he never really left those haystacks after all.

The eight tracks on the album, which is being billed as a companion to Break It Yourself, are classic Bird: Folky, strum-heavy, violin-friendly, and too lively for background music but too lulling to really jam out to. As he told Billboard, he arranges his best songs naturally, with "the best ideas, the absurd ones, coming when you're relaxed, like doing the dishes." Or, you know, hanging in the barn. Whatever.

Check out all eight tracks now at the Guardian, and pick up the EP when it's released on October 30.

Photograph: Esther Kang