Antony and the Johnsons finally released much-anticipated new music last week with their 'Another World' EP. The effort, a precursor to the January release of the new album 'The Crying Light,' marks the band's first new music since the 2005 Mercury Prize-winning 'I Am a Bird Now.'

To commemorate the occasion, Antony Hegarty will be holding two special parties this week: one at L.A.'s Disney Hall and another at New York's Apollo, with both shows featuring orchestral support. "I wanted to do a concert on each coast to celebrate the release of the EP," Hegarty tells Spinner. "We'd been working on these symphonic arrangements -- me and Nico Muhly."

In addition to collaborating for the special events, Hegarty and Muhly worked closely on the new album, specifically that of symphonic flourishes. "We sat together and just chose note by note how we wanted them to go, and because they were new songs, I was really eager to keep them within the realm of something that felt familiar," he says. "We whittled them down to something that was quite subtle, which I was really happy with."

Hegarty plans to perform material from the EP, as well as three to four songs from the new album, including 'Everglade,' which Hegarty says is about "identifying -- like coming to a realization I'm home; That I was born of the world, that I'm not a visitor here."

The idea of nature is a central theme of 'The Crying Light.' "The last record was really about me looking in, healing, and in a way, this album was created of a similar intention, but it's more looking at the world outside me," Hegarty says. "It's trying to come to terms with my spiritual relationship to the world."