I mentioned when we featured Nicholas Sillitoe early in April with the single/track ‘Majesty’ that this album, ‘Let the wall of sound come down’ would be released shortly but as it turns out it blindsided me by coming out on 5th June.
I speculated about the concept, too, wondering if it might be a collective allusion to the Berlin Wall falling or something similar but as it turns out it merely underlines his personal philosophy about classical music like this, namely that it should help us to find silence, peace and quiet reflection.
Just like an Oasis concert…
Regrettably we can’t cover the full 10-track album and I selected this one, ‘We are all islands’ for several reasons.
Firstly because it has also been released as a single so will be familiar to some of his supporters.
Secondly because it reminded me of a favourite track of mine with a similar theme, ‘Soft Islands’ by Danish artist Lydmor; while being utterly different from it, that song being a barrage of ultra fast EDM.
Thirdly for political reasons (as is often the case with me) because it comes at the same time as the esteemed Prime Minister of the United Kingdom has seen fit to do another U-turn and withdraw a remark he made a few months ago to the effect that Britain is an ‘island of strangers’ partly because someone pointed out to him that (a) that makes it sound as if mass immigration is the cause and (b) because it was a phrase used by a Tory (opposition) political leader, Enoch Powell in the 1970s.
Is all this relevant? I would argue it is because Nicholas Sillitoe’s raison d’être is to step back from the fire and fury of worlds such as that of politics and to find that peace and silence that we know we seek.
Against the quiet hum of synthesisers a series of simple and repeated piano notes softly plays out. That’s it. But it is what it evokes…
I’ve used this allusion before, and applied cosmic references to ‘Majesty’, previously. At the 2019 Manchester International Festival, and 50 years after man first landed on the Moon, Laurie Anderson was commissioned to develop an ambitious dreamlike VR experience that took participants on their own lunar exploration,
I went on it myself, complete with a real astronaut’s seat and wearing a gigantic visor by which you really could believe you were in space, flying around the Dark Side of the Moon and landing there. I can’t recall the specific music that accompanied it now but as soon as I heard ‘We are all islands’ I had a Eureka! moment because I realised that was it, perfectly.
Indeed I’d recommend that he searches out other similar multimedia VR creators, whom I am sure would welcome his creations. Manchester alone has spawned several of these VR experience shows since then.
So in a single leap he’s gone from ‘Music for Airports’ (to which I likened ‘Majesty’) to Music for Space stations.
It is just shy of four minutes of sublime serendipity (and that isn’t a word I throw around often).
Check it out here then go straight to the album.
Find him on:
Website: https://www.plusfourseven.com/nicholassillitoe
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/sillitoe
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/plusfourseven/
