Black Midi have been stretching time and reinventing song dynamics over the last five years and now singer and in the wake of the statement that the band is “indefinitely over” while the members focus on other projects, guitarist Geordie Greep has announced he’s stepping out on his own with his debut solo album The New Sound (Rough Trade, Oct 4th).
The first single off the rank is the kaleidoscopic sonic pop explosion that is ‘Holy, Holy‘, a song that marries big band swinging croon with widescreen dynamics, a latin flavour and basically just a grand romantic sound, complete with a three-piano attack (Steinway, Bechstein, electric).
“With recording ‘The New Sound’, it was the first time I have had no one to answer to. And with every impulse I had, I was able to completely follow it through to its conclusion. Being in a band (black midi), we often have this ‘we can do everything’ feeling, but you are also kind of limited in that approach, and sometimes it’s good to do something else, to let go of things,” said Greep.
Over thirty session musicians were involved in the making of the album, on two continents, in São Paulo and London. Geordie Greep: “Some of the tracks we had recorded already, elsewhere, but it just wasn’t right, so we re-recorded them with new people. Half of the tracks were done in Brazil, with local musicians pulled together at the last minute. They’d never heard anything I’d done before, they were just interested in the demos I’d made. The tracking was all done in one, maybe two days. Then we did the overdubs later, in London.”
Doubtful Sounds 