Richard Barbieri has shared a new single "Serpentine" - the first single from his solo album Under A Spell released on 26th February through Kscope.
Boasting a ground-breaking career that began in the late 70's with synth-pop visionaries Japan and more recently as a member of influential art-rock band Porcupine Tree, Under A Spell is the first full length solo record from Richard Barbieri since 2017's Planets + Persona.
The first song to be heard from Under A Spell, "Serpentine" is a winding and expansive six-minute soundscape that weaves through multiple genres and ideas. Complex, calming, engrossing and experimental, "Serpentine" is the perfect primer for Under a Spell - the work of a visionary musician working at his creative height.
The song is accompanied by a new 360 video created by Miles Skarin, allowing the viewer to travel along the floor of a foreboding forest, inspired by a nightmare Richard experienced and explained to the filmmaker.
Barbieri didn't plan to make an album like Under A Spell, originally intending his fourth solo album to be a direct follow from its predecessor. That record, made in different studios across Europe and heavily incorporating live performances from a range of musicians, was adventurous and bold, showcasing Barbieri's endlessly inventive song writing and mastery of electronic music. The follow-up would pick up where it left off, journeying further into the expansive terrain he mapped out on the previous record. And then the COVID-19 pandemic hit, and everything changed. "I wrote and recorded it in my studio at home, with all this strangeness going on outside," says Barbieri of Under A Spell. "It became something completely different: this weird, self-contained dream-state album."
Barbieri's willingness to constantly redefine his own musical boundaries are never more evident than on the brilliant, hypnotic Under A Spell - the latest milestone on this utterly unique journey.