Sam Forrest - The Edge of Nowhere

The Edge of Nowhere

Sam Forrest

Formats Tracks Price Buy
CD Album 10 tracks £7.99 Out of stock
Download Album () 10 tracks £7.99
Download Album (MP3) 10 tracks £7.99
Download Album (MP3) 10 tracks £7.99
Download Album () 10 tracks £7.99
Download Album (MP3) 10 tracks £7.99
Download Album (MP3) 10 tracks £7.99
Download individual tracks From £0.99

Description

Sam Forrest - The Edge of Nowhere

Sam Forrest - The Edge Of Nowhere

Continuing the sonic experiments on 2010’s No Imagination, The Edge Of Nowhere is a fine spread of semi-acoustic pop goodness. Whilst his band, Nine Black Alps, have slipped from the popular press, Sam has been recording beehives of honey treasures waiting to be indulged. Like Idlewild’s Roddy Woomble’s solo career, Sam has produced rustic masterpieces for years and The Edge Of Nowhere captures his imagination and ear for the unusual at it’s best.

Its raw quality is reflected in the way it was recorded. Produced in Sam’s and Desert Mine Music’s Factory Of Unprofessional Sound late last year, you can hear the room’s cold air adding an unambiguous atmosphere. This is most evident on the wonderfully dark Crow, a perfect choice for opener with a slow groove, melodic flow of lyrics and hypnotic riff. It’s very Sam and a welcome introduction to his solo work, seemingly the soundtrack to walking through the forest at night with fallen leaves crunching at your feet and the eeriness of the night acting the canvas for escape.

That sinister sense of one man realising the status quo is damaged and abnormal is a common theme throughout and the title track continues the flow of ponderous alternative acoustic bliss whilst questioning where to go once you’ve escaped from a mundane existence. Musically, it’s awash with tastefully layers, bluesy lead guitar and an entrancing waterfall of notes cascading over the catchy, dream filled chorus.

In the age of singer-song writers boring the charts with their abyss of eternal nothingness, The Edge… is proudly removed and sits on the shelve of alternative folk, acoustic Americana and the independently minded. The mellow, thoughtful purrs of Feel The Same and the heavy homely punch of Thorn point to a traditional take on the finger picking chimes of the solo artist via hushed vocals from the English countryside.

Indeed, Sam’s position of an independent musician makes the helter skelter of The Edge… free from pressured commercialism. During the album’s creation, Sam became impatient waiting for a drummer and picked up the sticks himself to add a less is more dynamic that glues his ideas together neatly.

With other musical commitments; Benjamin Francis Leftwich tour manager and guitar tech, being half of The Sorry Kisses, recording fellow Sorry Kisser, Hayley Hutchinson’s, solo albums and working on the forthcoming Nine Black Alps record, Sam worked on these songs quickly to keep their spirit alive. Awakening at 7am to complete a new tune before 10am, you can almost smell the fresh pot of tea brewing and the morning sunlight poking through the windowpanes on Everyone Know It, Scarecrow and Insects In My Blood. These stories of solitary figures, offer a poetic calm and snapshot at a man at peace with his work.

After nine tracks of acoustic originals splattered with psychedelic electric guitars and droney but melodic waltzes, think Beck and Faust trying out do each other, Sam’s direction is complete with final track, In Love. Added in demo form from an earlier session as he couldn’t replicate the same feeling again, it’s a fitting climax with swirling vocal melodies and lullaby glow of wisdom with the line “Everyone can see how I happy I can be in love”.

Remembering how hard Sam works on various projects, it is amazing to hear him committed and creatively at ease. The Edge Of Nowhere is the ever-open door for the masses to step inside the quirky world of a majestic English and acoustic emporium.

Reviews

From The Vectis Radar by Jack Gorman

The man from York has done it again offering an early contender for album of 2012.
 
WHILST THE masses inappropriately touch themselves at the sounds of Ed Sheeran boreathon-dribble and the world feels like it’s a second away from imploding with shame when another soulless records of faux-urban-shit is celebrated, it is a great relief that Sam Forrest’s imagination is still active and being put to tape.

Whilst everyone went ape for his band, Nine Black Alps, début Everything Is only to forget about them after they digested the next spoonful of impotent, trilby wearing, diddering bands from the popular press-Sam continued producing albums of brilliance.

From 2008′s first solo record, Down The Hillside to 2010′s No Imagination, Sam has been quietly writing semi-acoustic, rustic snap shots of escape. This latest offering, The Edge Of Nowhere, fits neatly into his back catalogue and is, arguably, his best record yet.

Wonderfully dark opener Crow slowly grinds into an hypnotic riff rich with eerie and inviting melodies. It is nothing akin to what is polluting the charts and feels like a glorious finding, a little out of time and out of place but thoroughly refreshing.  Whilst the title track follows the feel of semi-acoustic dreamy pop and full of archaic lead guitar and and an ever catchy chorus. Lyrically, Sam pushes the boundaries of perception, in the title track we meet a character with a “mirror for a face” in a house where “every day is a night” which adds a psychedelic shine and sense of intrigue.

But elsewhere on the record it is very much one man proudly finger picking a vintage guitar and painting pictures of characters on the landscape. Feel The Same is thoughtful, slow and engulfing whilst Thorn packs a heavy rustic punch. Meanwhile, Scarecrow is sparse story of solitary figure watching over the land, all are engaging narratives and harmonious.

Whereas Everyone Knows It rolls like the sunlight on an early morning walk, poppy and simply effective, Young Pretenders is a little fighter of a song and seemingly a relation to ‘Alps’ Buy Nothing. It documents the current trend of celebrity and most prominently children of celebrities that rise to fame get all the “prescription pills“, “sports cars on gravel drives” and gets maids to change their sheets. It’s a quirky number too, the hooks remain over a stop-start bass line.

Such a concise and engrossing record needs to have striking finale and The Edge Of Nowhere does not disappoint. In Love is captured in a perfect lullaby setting, perfectly dry guitars and note perfect hushed vocals on a song comparing love to a song. It’s  brilliant and a blue-ribbon bookend to an album full of wonder.

A perfect album-9/10

"Beautiful, dark and a little left field. The perfect antidote to the identikit guitar music currently dominating the charts." One&Other

"Dark, aching, luscious indie folk that drives you to the edge of suicide before you realize that it is songs like Crow that make life worth living." Syffal.com

Tracklisting

CD Album (DMM012)
  1. Crow
  2. Feel the Same
  3. The Edge of Nowhere
  4. Thorn
  5. Everyone Knows It
  6. Young Pretenders
  7. Something to Get Used to
  8. Scarecrow
  9. Insects in My Blood
  10. In Love
Download Album (DMM012)
  1. Crow
  2. Feel the Same
  3. The Edge of Nowhere
  4. Thorn
  5. Everyone Knows It
  6. Young Pretenders
  7. Something to Get Used to
  8. Scarecrow
  9. Insects in My Blood
  10. In Love
Download Album (DMM012)
  1. Crow
  2. Feel The Same
  3. The Edge Of Nowhere
  4. Thorn
  5. Everyone Knows It
  6. Young Pretenders
  7. Something To Get Used To
  8. Scarecrow
  9. Insects In My Blood
  10. In Love