When Ed O’ Brien began looking at producers for his second solo album one name kept cropping up; Paul Epworth, who in the past had worked with Adele and Rihanna and was also the proud owner of no less than seven Grammy awards. There was a link, in so much that both men’s children went to the same London school, but even though O’ Brien is a guitarist in one of the world’s biggest bands, he felt that any approach might be met with cool disdain. When he finally plucked up the courage to broach the subject it turned out that so did Epworth.
The pair rapidly forged a creative patnership as equals, spending weekends together at a house in rural Wales and developing the material which would in final form become Blue Morpho. Named after a butterfly native to Brazil, it was a record that had much riding on it for it’s creator, largely due to his permanent dissatisfaction with it’s pandemic-era released pedecessor, Earth.
It’s both a rcord that you might expect and not. Opener Incantations allows some of the perma-angst to be lifted from Radiohead’s kinetic gait, it’s rattling, rolling meter never settling, whilst the funky licks employed on Teachers shift perspective – think the works of Bonobo, or Fink – and the cinematic title track revels in it’s grace. The best however is saved for last, the ten minute closer Obrigado snaking through Latin rhythms and drifting ambient motifs then lulling into a hazy, heavy lidded calm. The record you sense Ed O’ Brien wanted to make half more than half a decade ago but didn’t have the tools, Blue Morpho is proof that even speculative questions can yield wondrous results.
You can read a full review here.
The Voice Of Unreason 