Sound Colour Vibration (Music | Art | Film | Technology | Science | Culture)

Andy Cartwright’s musical moniker Seabuckthorn has become a dominant fixture in my life for late night’s and early morning’s over the last few months. From Witney, Oxfordshire, UK, Seabuckthorn’s music has grown on me in the same way Black Eagle Child, Julian Lynch, Ilyas Ahmed and many other practitioners of the spiritual fusion state of acoustic psych folk. There is a state of zen that encompasses the music, speaking a language that goes into ancestral states of the east just as much as it taps into the extensions of the future. Also built around a modal atmosphere that bridges modern folk and experimental shades of todays technology, the state of musical being that Seabuckthorn represents pulls from areas of this world that accumulate into a very enlightening form.

Having landed into his hemisphere of music creation with this latest outing, The Silence Woke Me, which is the second release of his on the imprint Bookmaker Records, my senses were immediately taken over by the glowing spiritual voice that speaks loud and clear on this record. A bulk of the album is centered around lush hand picking on acoustic 6 and 12 string guitars, showing a very large body of emotional ideas from song to song. The music swells with a huge sense of space always present, revealing the smallest nuances such as the rattle of the lower strings on an acoustic or the wavering placement of a drone inside the mix. Electric guitar, percussion and many other components further shape the body of each song, pulling in all sounds to the core and center with a strong sense of gravitational pull.

The Silence Woke Me reveals much of its energy toward the cosmic weight of drones, the deep meditations of the east, native american mysticism, modern folk, 60′s derived psychedelia and a state of antiquity that is timeless. It’s a powerful bridging of sounds through generations and into the future that captures a voice that can easily be associated to this artist alone. When the essence of antiquity is present, the music enters a very special and unique territory. The addition of 12 string acoustic is utilized beautifully in many of the pieces, showering in a wavering pattern of natural tones that is something not many musicians are using in these times. Every song moves smoothly into the next on The Silence Woke Me, diving into different states in each song that are exotically hypnotizing. I had no clue what to expect when I got this album and not even four songs in on the initial listen and I knew I really loved this artists approach.

I feel a sense of awakening in The Silence Woke Me that evades cliché and over used principles towards the mystic element of sound. Every piece glows and glistens with a cosmic force that stretches far outside of this realm of existence. This is music of another age and shines with infinite levels of beauty from beginning to end. I have not been able to put this record down since I got it.

-Erik Otis

Digifile CD / 10 tracks (47’15) / Ltd 200

Order from Bookmaker Records