Mid Air

Description

2 x 12 release on 180 gram heavyweight Vinyl plus 20 page lyric booklet.

Paul Buchanan, mainstay of Glaswegian soulful pop perfectionists The Blue Nile, releases his debut solo album Mid Air on May 21st 12 on Newsroom Records via Essential. Mid Air was recorded at home in Glasgow, at a friends house on the East Coast of Scotland, and at Gorbals Sound, a state of the art studio thats bringing new life to a part of Glasgow traditionally thought less than salubrious. The Blue Niles Robert Bell dropped by to offer a few thoughts as the work neared completion (I wouldnt dream of putting something out without playing it to him), but Buchanan is the only musician on the record.

Mid Air is an extraordinarily intimate record, its spare piano and vocal-based arrangements unfurling at a meditative pace. Thirteen of its fourteen tracks are less than three minutes long, but rest assured all life is here. Buchanans beautifully bruised voice remains a faithful conduit of all things emotive, and Mid Air was written from a place of humility and wee-small-hours contemplation.

Says Paul: I think if Id tried to make a record that sounds like the band Id be quite nervous, but this is more of a record-ette. Its quite small in stature and the songs are very brief, but dont get me wrong it kept me awake at night.

Buchanan also concedes that, in some ways, he is continually re-writing the same song, chipping away at the themes that have absorbed him from day one. Far above the chimney tops / Take me where the bus dont stop he sings here on My True Country. Naturally, such starry-eyed sentiments will chime with fans of the Blue Niles charmed 1983 debut, A Walk Across The Rooftops. At root, these beautifully smudged miniatures represent a still more potent distillation of all that has made Buchanans past work so special. Mid Air his little record-ette as he calls it is wonderfully big of heart.