Geordie Greep, the celebrated frontman of Black Midi, is bringing his debut solo album, The New Sound, to Australian stages this July and August.
The New Sound is a record that throws open the doors on what happens when there’s no one else in the room to answer to. As he puts it “Music can be so much more than learning to play the same as everybody else. It can be anything you want.”
That freedom runs right through the record. A sprawling, high-quality take on alternative pop that leans into both the absurd and the meticulous. To achieve this ambitious sound, Greep enlisted over thirty session musicians across two continents. Notably, half the album was tracked in Brazil with local players, who reacted purely to the demos, having no prior knowledge of Greep's work.
The result is a record that moves fast and unpredictably. The instrumental title track lands somewhere between jazz-funk and theatrical score, while elsewhere songs shift quickly between whispers and full-band explosions. There are traces of Frank Zappa, Frank Sinatra and Scott Walker in the mix, but nothing settles long enough to sit comfortably in one place.
Lyrically, Greep plays emcee to a rotating cast of characters caught in increasingly strange scenarios. The world of The New Sound - populated by cafes, bars, rented rooms, and cabarets - is where fantasy and reality blur, and the characters convince themselves they are in control even as everything around them suggests otherwise.
With plans to continue working with different musicians in different places, Greep’s live shows follow the same instinct: no two nights landing the same way.
This July and August, Australian audiences get a first look at The New Sound live.