The Nearer the Fountain, More Pure the Stream Flows

by Damon Albarn

Overview

Damon Albarn conceived The Nearer the Fountain, More Pure the Stream Flows -- his second solo album, arriving seven years after Everyday Robots -- as an orchestral ode to his adopted homeland of Iceland. Albarn's plans were scuppered by the COVID-19 pandemic, so he altered his approach, adapting and altering the material he wrote in Iceland in January 2020 with the aid of two longtime collaborators: Simon Tong, the guitarist in the Good, the Bad & the Queen, and Mike Smith, an auxiliary player in both Blur and Gorillaz. The Nearer the Fountain retains some of the airy atmosphere of an orchestral piece, yet it's untethered to the ground. As it floats in the slipstream, the album shifts its shape, sometime luxuriating in open spaces, sometimes snapping in focus thanks to a pronounced beat or shimmering wash of analog keyboards. The open sonic vistas owe a debt to Albarn's abiding love of Iceland, a devotion which manifests itself through aural ambience and lyrics where isolation intertwines environmental decay. As he often delivers his lines with little more than a slight murmur -- the title phrase, taken from a John Clare poem, recurs throughout the album -- the emphasis is on the music, not the words. Unhurried and stark without being austere, The Nearer the Fountain, More Pure the Stream Flows seems suspended from time but not place: as misty and evocative as it is, the music is grounded in a specific location, which gives this elegiac, enveloping album an emotional weight. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine

Product Details

Release Date:	11/12/2021
Label:	Transgressive
UPC:	5400863061074
Rank:	39854

Tracks

1. The Nearer the Fountain, More Pure the Stream Flows
2. The Cormorant
3. Royal Morning Blue
4. Combustion
5. Daft Wader
6. Darkness to Light
7. Esja
8. The Tower of Montevideo
9. Giraffe Trumpet Sea
10. Polaris
11. Particles

Album Credits

Performance Credits

Damon Albarn   Primary Artist,Bells,Drums,Organ,Piano,Harmonia,Harmonium,Monochord,Wurlitzer,Farfisa Organ,Fender Rhodes,Guitar (Bass),Guitar (Acoustic)
Simon Tong   Drums,Guitar (Acoustic),Guitar (Electric)
Carol Jarvis   Trombone (Bass)
Mike Smith   Organ,Harmonium,Saxophone,Farfisa Organ
Andre de Ridder   Violin
Bergrun Snaebjoernsdottir   French Horn
Sigrun Jonsdottir   Trombone
Shelley Soerensen   Viola
Shelley Sorenson   Viola
Sam Egglenton   Guitar (Bass)
Romain Bly   Marimba,French Horn
Josephine Stephenson   Cello
Alexina Hawkins   Viola
Caimin Gilmore   Double Bass
Laura Nygren   Double Bass
Rakel Bjorn Helgadottir   French Horn

Technical Credits

Damon Albarn   Composer,Producer
Simon Tong   Composer
Stephen Sedgwick   Mixing
John Davis   Mastering
Mike Smith   Composer,Composer
John Clare   Composer
Marton Perlaki   Photography
Andre de Ridder   Composer
Sam Egglenton   Drum Programming,Additional Production
Arni Benediktsson   Field Recording
Nathan Prince   Creative Director
Rory McGrath   Creative Director