MARISSA NADLER Featured On Latest Single From LOST HORIZONS

Lost Horizons - the project of Cocteau Twins' Simon Raymonde & Richie Thomas of Dif Juz - released part one of its new album In Quiet Moments at the end of 2020 and is set to release part two, as well as the physical of the double album, on February 26th via Bella Union. Every track on the album features a guest vocalist, and today's new single "Marie" features Marissa Nadler. The music video footage was created by Nadler while the editing and direction was done by Penelope Isles' Jack Wolter. Watch the video for "Marie" below.

Of the track, Lost Horizons said: "I don't think there was ever a second I wasn't going to find a song for Marissa to sing on the new lp. SO much cool stuff came out of our last collaborations on Ojalá, indeed I think we ended up recording four songs from the original idea of doing one! Marissa is a really great & generous collaborator as she really throws herself in deep, and commits to it fully. That is a rare and beautiful gift and Richie and I appreciate it enormously. It was a beast of a track to mix I'll be honest, and that had nothing to do with Marissa's vocals, in fact they were a breeze to mix. But the initial music that Richie and I improvised in our basement studio in Brighton was a bit messy and we didn't use a click or anything to keep tempo so fixing anything later was a lost cause, but it is such a cool piece that i loved creating (i think i put 4 maybe 5 bass parts on with my old trusty Fender VI string bass guitar!) that even when it's kinda falling apart during that instrumental section near the end, i still love it. It probably sounds like it took half an hour to mix but the truth is it took weeks of starting it, scrapping it, starting over, scrapping it, etc. And yes, i fully intend to ask Marissa to contribute to our next one too."

Marissa Nadler adds: "It was a dream to collaborate with Simon and Ritchie for Lost Horizons again. Marie is an aquatic reverie about this title character entering different dimensions. Maybe we're all feeling a little submerged, watching the time. This stream of consciousness song came from listening to the track that Simon sent, and birthed this hypnagogic hallucination of a story."

In 2017, Simon Raymonde and Richie Thomas had both abstained from making music for 20 years until they united as Lost Horizons and released a stunning debut album, Ojalá - the Spanish word for "hopefully" or "God willing."

"These days, we need hope more than ever, for a better world." Thomas said at the time. "And this album has given me a lot of hope. To reconnect with music.... And the hope for another Lost Horizons record!"

Thomas' hopes had a mixed response. On the plus side, the new Lost Horizons album In Quiet Moments is an even stronger successor to Ojalá

with another distinguished cast of guest singers and a handful of supporting instrumentalists embellishing the core duo's gorgeously free-flowing and loose-limbed blueprint that one writer astutely labelled, "melancholy-delia."

On the minus side, any hope for a better world, as Earth continues to freefall toward political and social meltdown. Then, to make matters worse, as Raymonde and Thomas buckled down to create the improvised bedrock that Lost Horizons is built on, the former's mother died. At least Raymonde had a way to channel his grief. "The way improvisation works," he says, "it's just what's going on with your body at the time, to let it out."

Raymonde (bass, guitar, keyboards, production) and Thomas (drums, occasional keys and guitar) forged ahead, creating 16 instrumental tracks to send to prospective guests. When he did, Raymonde suggested a guiding theme for their lyrics: "Death and rebirth. Of loved ones, of ideals, at an age when many artists that have inspired us are also dead, and the planet isn't far behind. But I also said, 'The most important part is to just do your own thing, and have fun."

And then Covid-19 hit. Half of In Quiet Moments' lyrics were written after lockdown, but Raymonde saw a silver lining: people were slowing down and taking stock of their lives. Hearing a lyric written by veteran singer Ural Thomas, known as "Portland's Pillar of Soul", who fronts the title track, Raymonde singled out the phrase "in quiet moments" and made it the album title. "It just made sense," he says. "This moment of contemplation in life is really beautiful. The title also went with the album cover, a photograph by Jacques-Henri Lartigue from the 1940s of a woman and dog on a beach, captured as if in flight."

Lost Horizons' melancholy-delia also feels buoyed aloft by airy currents, informed in part by Raymonde and Thomas' former respective bands: the legendary Cocteau Twins and Dif Juz. Their former bands were labelmates on 4AD in the mid-80s, which is how they first met.

In Quiet Moments has its pockets of loss but - aligned to the concept of 'hope' - the album is more about rebirth than death. "I think it's more joyous than Ojalá," says Thomas. "But both albums have a great energy about them."

Those energy levels undulate across a dazzling array of moods and voices; as broad as the name Lost Horizons sounds. Take the first three tracks: the melting rapture of "Halcyon" featuring Jack Wolter of Bella Union signings Penelope Isles, the simmering urban-soulful "I Woke Up With An Open Heart" featuring Nubiya Brandon of The Hempolics and the quintessentially melancholy-delic "Grey Tower" featuring a returning Tim Smith .

Also returning from Ojalá are Gemma Dunleavy, Karen Peris (the innocence mission), Cameron Neal (Horse Thief) and Marissa Nadler. The last three are all Bella Union family members; likewise, John Grant (the lush, choral "Cordelia", etched by David Rothon's pedal steel and Fiona Brice's elegant strings) and Ren Harvieu (a sultry "Unravelling In Slow Motion"), and new signing Laura Groves (the jazz-tinged "Blue Soul"), all making their Lost Horizons debuts.

Dana Margolin of the hugely acclaimed Porridge Radio lends the rampant "One For Regret'' her trademark bristling energy; at the other end of the spectrum, 'Flutter' features Rosie Blair (of former Bella Union signing Ballet School) adding exquisite blue notes to a stark palate of Thomas' piano and Fiona Brice's strings. Deploying his A&R acumen, Raymonde called on new Swedish discovery Kavi Kwai for the Cocteaus-evoking "Every Beat That Passed" ("You can't make music for as long as I have and drop all your influences and habits overnight," says Raymonde). Also present are Lily Wolter (of Penelope Isles) under her solo pseudonym KookieLou, and C Duncan. A richer and more varied cast list would be very hard to find.

"I think In Quiet Moments is more in the direction of where we're going," Thomas concludes. "People have retreated into their lives and, in those quiet moments, reflected on the world, how we fit in and who we trust. Maybe the next album will be about rebellion! But the road is long and winding. We just need to express ourselves in how we feel at the time."

Watch the video here:

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