Jörð Petrels

• 1A Little Dust05:01
• 2Terra Nullius04:32
• 3The Last Shard Falls04:33
• 4Waldgeist07:45
• 5The Long Man09:12
• 6Seithenyn Sleeps11:55
• Total Runtime42:58

Info for Jörð

Petrels is the solo project of London-based musician and illustrator, Oliver Barrett. Since releasing his debut Haeligewielle in 2011, Petrels has toured across Europe and shared a stage with the likes of Tim Hecker, FIRE!, Nate Young (Wolf Eyes), Trouble Books, Demdike Stare, Nadja, and Hans-Joachim Roedelius (Cluster). Having also collaborated with and provided remixes for artists as varied as Duane Pitre, Brassica, Talvihorros and Max Cooper, Petrels' output is proving to be thrillingly eclectic and unpredictable.

Following on from 2015's Flailing Tomb LP, which made numerous end of year lists, Petrels – the solo project of London-based musician and illustrator, Oliver Barrett – returns with new album, Jörð. From the ethereal choral build of 'A Little Dust' (adapted from words by W. B. Yeats), to the euphoric aural scree of 'The Last Shard Falls', and the driving, long-form song structures, interwoven arrangements and mythological trappings of 'The Long Man', previous listeners of Barrett's work will find much to welcome in a record that builds on the distinctive, ecstatic Petrels sound.

From the ethereal choral build of 'A Little Dust' (adapted from words by W. B. Yeats), to the euphoric aural scree of 'The Last Shard Falls', and the driving, long-form song structures, interwoven arrangements and mythological trappings of 'The Long Man', previous listeners of Barrett's work will find much to welcome in a record that builds on the distinctive, ecstatic Petrels sound.

Elsewhere, Barrett teases this sound into new shapes; 'Terra Nullius' takes an oscillating woodwind cluster and hangs from it a defiant and densely constructed (almost)pop song; 'Waldgeist' slowly unravels a deceptively simple string refrain in an elegiac and gently expanding, haunted pastoral arrangement; and 'Seithenyn Sleeps' encapsulates the joyously overwhelming live Petrels sound into a swirling, enveloping closer.

Drawing together the numerous strands of Petrels releases so far whilst confidently weaving them together into something new that promises even more to come, Jörð is another singular release from this restlessly inventive and inventively restless artist.

Since releasing his debut Haeligewielle in 2011, Petrels has toured across Europe and shared a stage with the likes of Tim Hecker, FIRE!, Nate Young (Wolf Eyes), Trouble Books, Demdike Stare, Nadja, and Hans-Joachim Roedelius (Cluster). Having also collaborated with and provided remixes for artists as varied as Duane Pitre, Brassica, Talvihorros and Max Cooper, Petrels' output is proving to be thrillingly eclectic and unpredictable.

„Petrels sidesteps the chilliness found in much of the music of his peers, replacing it instead with an almost spiritual ecstasy, his ravishing synths and almost choral vocal treatments calling out in cosmic, wide eyed wonder at the universe.” (Paul Margree, Louder Than War)

Oliver Barrett

Petrels (aka Oliver Barrett)
is the solo project of Oliver Barrett of Bleeding Heart Narrative. His sound is a deluge of beautiful noise and crushing melody, which ebbs and flows beneath the surface. Utilizing bowed strings, bent electronics, found percussion and occasional vocals, his sound tells a forgotten story, buried underneath the stones and water.

'Petrels has provided us with what has to be the strongest solo debut from a musician so far in 2011. It’s as if Barrett has launched his solo career as Petrels by giving us his own Sisyphus narrative, and somehow it sounds dreadfully authentic – no small feat. Haeligewielle is an album so dense and immersive you sometimes feel as though you are drowning or being smothered, but that’s exactly the way it’s supposed to feel.' (Brendan Moore, Fluid Radio)

'Haeligewielle (holy well, sacred spring) is an album of creation and destruction, holiness and human honor. Its characters and etimologies dance around each other like fish in a waterspout. The album is a masterpiece of narrative, a blackened ship with a broken mast that defies the storm and in so doing discovers its own dark destiny.' (Richard Allen, The Silent Ballet (8.5/10))

'Haeligewielle is Oliver Barrett’s (also of Bleeding Heart Narrative) first solo album as Petrels. It is a song of water, a song of stone. These two elements form the album’s thematic core, entwined in the story of the central figure of William Walker, the Winchester diver; but they also inform the album’s sonic makeup – onrushing, buoyant, coursing and at times dense and abrasive. It’s a record that excavates, and extrapolates outwards from, a particular and resonant historical undertaking and in its jubilant expansiveness grants it mythic, numinous life.' (Matt Poacher, The Liminal)

This album contains no booklet.