This has been hearsay for well over a decade at this point, but Billboard reports that the neo-soul deity D’angelo may finally release his long-awaited third in 2014, according to Kevin Liles, the artist’s manager. Since 2011, when Questlove told Pitchfork that D’angelo’s new album was “97% done” and sounds like “the black version of [The Beach Boys’] Smile”, we’ve been teased like crazy about new material. In 2012 he held a comeback concert in Stockholm and then he had a in-depth feature in GQ. All signs pointed to a new album then, but alas…

However, a shiny new ray of hope has emerged, as D’angelo’s manager confidently told Billboard that a new album was on the way this year:

“There’ll be an album this year: there’s 14 records so far, we might have a couple of bonus records, but all the recording is basically done and we’re mixing and mastering now. Definitely, he’ll be back.”

For a neo-soul obsessive like me, this is huge news, and I will take anything that I can get, even if it means absorbing all new information with a healthy-sized grain of salt. For perspective: remember when we thought that third My Bloody Valentine album was just a nice gauze-wrapped fantasy? Hopefully we will be able to look back at the D’angelo wait with good humor by the end of the year.

Below, watch D’angelo’s recent lecture at the Red Bull Music Academy New York festival, and then turn up the sexy by listening to D’angelo’s cover of Roberta Flack’s “Feel Like Makin’ Love.”