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Home Diaries 004

by andrew sherwell

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about

Part of Whitelabrecs Home Diaries series. Please visit their Bandcamp page to hear the other entries in the series.

From the label:
"Home Diaries is an invitation to artists and musicians to create an album or EP to document their personal experience during the lockdown or social distancing conditions that are upon us, due to the coronavirus outbreak. The series reflects a range of sounds, styles and ideas, as each artist portrays their own reflections uniquely. Each release is digital only for now, as we hope to raise what we can to help keep our label ticking over at this time. The releases feature a recurring polaroid image of a small lonely house, with a coloured filter chosen by the artist for each respective release. We interview each artist and this is included as a bonus PDF with the download. You can also check out the Home Diaries series direct from the artist themselves or on Spotify if you prefer.

For our next release, we are pleased that Andrew Sherwell returns to our label with a mini album, after having released Orthodox Tales with us back in 2018. This collection of recordings was composed in an empty Evesham (UK), against a backdrop of struggles. It captures the routine he has established, between balancing his business in this difficult time, his brief time outdoors during quiet walks to and from work and the evenings, which he fills with music to contrast the silence of the day.

This album makes use of small fragments of unused sound from his previous work, as these snapshots of a previous life are woven into the fabric of the present. He wanted to capture the solitude and repetition of the days he spends and made use of domestic field recordings along the way. He wanted to shine a light into the mundane and reveal the hidden beauty of solitude. Whilst the music is deep and textured, it can be all too easy to sink into its vacant, ghost-town environments as the concept of routine wrestles quietly within a situation that is eerily new.

"London-based ambient drone artist Andrew Sherwell captures a palpable essence of loneliness and stillness in these sumptuously-textured, melancholic soundscapes."
Stationary Travels

"Unsettling comfort, terribly uplifting, an album at odds with its own emotions, nothing better really, if you can pull it off, and I'd say Sherwell does that."
Lost Tribe Sounds

"For his contribution to the series, Andrew Sherwell manipulated small unused fragments of sound from his previous work to create a remarkably coherent mini-album capturing “the solitude and repetition of the days” while using “domestic field recordings” in the process. It starts out rather dark, but gradually reveals “the hidden beauty of solitude” – especially in the use of the choral samples in a track, titled “Balcony Views 3am”. When you hear such heavenly choirs on your balcony at night, you know that something special is happening to the world. The last track, called “End of Another Shitty Day in Paradise”, made me wish all my shitty days sounded like this. “I have always found melancholy a constant bedfellow anyway, but there is a level of distancing, everyday social but also emotional, that the new situation fosters,” says Sherwell. “But also, there are new elements of surprise and beauty to be found in solitude, in the lack of others. You see and experience your surroundings in a different way.”
Headphone Commute

New this week, the U.K.’s Andrew Sherwell contributes a fuzzy meditation on solitude.

"Perhaps I gravitate most to Sherwell’s entry because his experience is similar to my own, despite the difference in continents. Sherwell writes of “the hidden beauty of solitude” and the repetition of new routines, which include “quiet walks to and from work in the evenings.” Heavy field recordings form a constant backdrop, first appearing as static and rain before transmuting into waves. The sea washes over the musical ambience like a cumulative calendar, reflecting the title “Circular Days.” Back and forth, around and around, repeat. In “Balcony Views 3am” the wind becomes the main character, along with the crackling and rustling of nearby objects. It’s all forlorn and grey, like the cover: an image repeated with every Home Diaries release, the color filter chosen by the participating artist.

But then a tiny bit of light breaks through. Midway into “Balcony Views 3am,” a filtered choir offers a modicum of hope. These are trying times, difficult times, impossible times. Yet there is still “beauty in solitude” for those fortunate enough to locate that quiet center. Even as the choir recedes and the wind continues, their memory offers encouragement; and the harmonies don’t hide for long. The title “End of Another Shitty Day in Paradise” is tongue-in-cheek, because on the one hand, it was another long and lonely day, but on the other, we got through it, and for most of us, another awaits."
A Closer Listen (Richard Allen)

credits

released April 20, 2020

Written and produced by Andrew Sherwell in early April, 2020.
Mastered by James Edward Armstrong
Artwork Harry Towell

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andrew sherwell London, UK

"As the shadows closed in, the stars came out"
Derek Jarman

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