The man whose illustrious career began in the late 70\u2019s with synth-pop visionaries Japan and more recently as a member of influential art-rock band Porcupine Tree follows up 2017’s \u2018Planets + Persona\u2019 with new album \u2018Under A Spell\u2019. \u2018Planets + Persona\u2019 was adventurous and bold, showcasing Barbieri\u2019s endlessly inventive song writing and mastery of electronic music. \u2018Under A Spell\u2019 picks up where that left off, journeying further into the expansive terrain he had sonically mapped out. When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, everything changed. \u201cI wrote and recorded it in my studio at home, with all this strangeness going on outside,\u201d says Barbieri. \u201cIt became something completely different: this weird, self-contained dream-state album.\u201d<\/p>\n
On \u2018Under A Spell\u2019, Barbieri was intent on capturing the atmospheres and moods that his disconnected brain was conjuring rather than slaving over arrangements and melodies. Songs such as \u2018Flare\u2019, \u2018Serpentine\u2019, \u2018Sleep Will Find You\u2019 and its companion piece-of-sorts \u2018Darkness Will Find You\u2019 are sharply defined despite their dream-inspired genesis. The album\u2019s title perfectly encapsulates the haunting, evocative world Barbieri has created. Songs such as the skittering, billowing \u2018Clockwork\u2019 and \u2018Sketch 6\u2019s dub-inspired soundscape hang suspended in that strange half-world between sleep and waking \u2013 a subconscious reflection of the surreal state the planet has found itself in over recent months.<\/p>\n
There are voices but no vocals, collaborators include Marillion frontman Steve Hogarth and Swedish singer Lisen Rylander Love (who co-wrote \u2018A Star Light\u2019).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Under A Spell (2LP\/Gatefold)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":22518,"template":"","meta":[],"product_brand":[3048],"product_cat":[142,29],"product_tag":[1131],"class_list":{"0":"post-22517","1":"product","2":"type-product","3":"status-publish","4":"has-post-thumbnail","6":"product_brand-hrr","7":"product_cat-electronic","8":"product_cat-prog","9":"product_tag-kscope","11":"first","12":"outofstock","13":"shipping-taxable","14":"purchasable","15":"product-type-simple"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vinylgrove.nl\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product\/22517","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vinylgrove.nl\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vinylgrove.nl\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/product"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vinylgrove.nl\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22518"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vinylgrove.nl\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22517"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"product_brand","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vinylgrove.nl\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product_brand?post=22517"},{"taxonomy":"product_cat","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vinylgrove.nl\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product_cat?post=22517"},{"taxonomy":"product_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vinylgrove.nl\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/product_tag?post=22517"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}