Following the success of Nat Birchall’s ‘Akhenaten’ release in June 2009. We are pleased to announce that his new album entitled ‘Guiding Spirit’ will be released on Gondwana Records on Monday 24th May 2010.
Guiding Spirit opens with ‘Open Up The Gates’ invoking the idea of huge ancient gates being opened to allow the procession through but with a subtext of acceptance and recognition. Keep the Light Shining’ is a sunny tune, infused with the optimism of a new day, while ‘Higher Regions’ has something of a McCoy Tyner vibe and features harpist Rachel Gladwin on kora.’Going To The Mountain’ is inspired by a simple phrase that Birchall heard Pharoah Sanders play and has an eastern feel “I’ve always been in awe of how some musicians can play the simplest things yet invest them with so much meaning, I try to achieve the same quality when I play, and in working with this phrase I ended up with this melody”. The uptempo ‘Becoming’ is named for something Duke Ellington once said, that he liked to have his music always “in a state of becoming” (which Birchall feels as something like a flower opening as you look at it rather than just seeing the flower already opened) and is enhanced by Fairhall’s luminous solo.
Finally the rubato ‘Guiding Spirit’ hints at the hidden forces or unconscious decisions (that instinctive gut feeling) that for Birchall drives both life and his own deeply felt music.
More information coming soon.