Manafonistas

Hi, Erik,

your second solo album, titled „Unrest“, possibly to be released in October on Hubro – and you’re right, it’s the dark „sister“ of „Heliographs“. It avoids all too obvious „signifiers“ of the „Punkt family“ and knows about sidestepping. Though there are known elements, the overall atmosphere tends to the „unknown“.

A music critic (dealing with Arve’s „Towards Language“) recommended writing a soundtrack for a horror movie. Seems a bit far-fetched, but here it is, the dark one, if you leave out the cliche sounds of the genre and stick to the ethereal field of the ungraspable. The better name would be „Unheimlichkeitsmusik“ (have fun translating this!)…

I think I’m good in sequencing tracks (after so many years of radio making – looking for common ground between the most disparate material), so I can say this sequence is top notch. For example: the places for Sidsel’s vocals, brilliant. For example: the penultimate, slightly percussive track, „Processing“, every other place on the album would lose that track’s impact. Arve and Sidsel are nicely separated as the two „lead vocals“ of the whole album.

I like your loose, free piano playing on the first two tracks, the Sidsel pieces are heavenly stuff of the dark matter resort, a thrilling performance of emotional in-between-states (really sad she hasn’t put out out a solo album in years, I wonder why).

Another highlight is your kind of singing or vocalising on the final track. The voice on „The Park“ has an entrancing flow, the melody is, if that makes sense, irresisitible in a low-key manner (no pushing, no crescendo). It has something of the „Weltentrücktheit“ of Brian Eno’s „Julie and I“… (and, you won’t believe it, but it’s true, you should do a vocal album in the future, not necessarily a-cappella ) …

Stuart Moxham would love that tune and, if he had found it decades ago for himself, he would have put it on The Gist’s „Embrace The Herd“ :)

The Gist was a follow-up of the legendary Young Marble Giants‘ „Colossal Youth“, one of my all time faves, and, just in these days, before going to Wales, I have been reading the book from the 33 1/3 series …

The great unmade album: Erik Honoré and Jan Bang invite Alison Statton for a song album that transports the ascetic sparseness of her magic anti-virtuoso-singing of 1980 to the Nordic spheres … or an Alison Statton-Erik Honoré-vocal double album: Lee Hazelwood would send flowers from the tower of song, no kidding …

I digress. Fine.

Look for a nice room with cozy chairs and free Capirinhas for the first pre-listening sesssion of the album at The Punktfestival 2017! In case there is one …

Best,

Michael

Hi Michael,

Thanks for this – much appreciated.

The “unheimlich” reference works fine for me, be it a reference to Freud (or Hitchcock …) or just “uncanny, dreamlike”.

Funny that you should mention a “vocal album”. Several of the tracks on “Unrest” actually started as demos featuring vocals. They had to be sacrificed for the greater good, and were banished to the “outtakes” playlist … I don’t have enough confidence in my singing to do a vocal album – or at least it would demand a lot of work to bring it to the required level.

And yes, Sidsel should definitely do a proper solo album soon – her “Manafon” – where she crystallizes her development since the “ECM songs albums” into the masterpiece she definitely has in her.

Again, thanks for your feedback. It means a lot.

Best,

Erik

 

 
 
 
„After the rapid success and demise of Young Marble Giants in 1980, I lived for a while in London, then Nottingham and finally Ilkeston, before prodigally returning to my home town of Cardiff.

I began to use multitrack recording, as a method of composition, whilst holed up in Nottingham, initially on a TEAC four track reel to reel and later a new-fangled, four track cassette Portastudio.“

All songs, singing and instruments written, performed and recorded by Stuart Moxham except where otherwise credited.

I took the title “Holding Pattern” from a recent, as yet unrecorded, song because I needed something pronto for this album. It wasn’t until I started writing these sleeve notes that I saw its significance; the music here having waited 35 years or so to land. Almost as bad as Heathrow.

Thanks to Drew, Stav, Spike, Deb and Ian K, for all their brilliant contributions and to John Henderson for seeing the value and having the faith, enthusiasm and stamina to make this record happen. Artwork by Leka and Aleksandra Mladenovic.“
 
release date: August, 24