After her now SAY-nominated album ‘Earth Mothers’, Glasgow-based artist Clair (aka Clair Crawford) has released a collaboration of sorts with San Francisco based Andy MacLennan (who sent her some field recordings of rainforest and jungle sounds) and she has fashioned them, along with instrumentation and vocals, into a kind of paean to nature’s wonder.
The track starts with a cacophony of birdsong plus descending keyboard notes and other treated sounds. As the track progresses it moves down from the trees and other deeper sounds emerge, some treated cello maybe as well, and the notes are deep and a bit dark. Gradually the birds fade out and we are in the middle of the wilderness, strings to the fore and other sounds welling up into some very emotional phrases. There are also vocals in the back of the mix, as it fades into nothing – a great piece and one that lets the imagination run riot, nothing too in your face but not coffee table or dinner party music either.
Hopefully a live set can be honed, as promised for 2023, as Clair’s music is original, thought-provoking and at times just surreally beautiful.