Craig Fortnam, composer for North Sea Radio Orchestra and Arch Garrison, released his first album last month titled ‘Ark’. It’s been described as his most personal and intensely realised record and intrinsically English with place and the natural world being recurring motifs.
In terms of place, the east coast of the UK looms large, here, symbolic of uncertainty, tumult, pain and change. The place names are evocative of a beautiful bleakness and vulnerability. The coastline is unstoppably eroded by and into the unknowable vastness of the ocean. The album has also been shaped by personal circumstances and loss. In the last few years Craig has lost his brother, mother and dear friend Tim Smith of Cardiacs. Some of the pieces and themes on Ark were written as requiems of a sort.
Below you can watch a live performance of the new album single ‘German Ocean’. It is about feeling cast adrift, floating on the German Ocean…like a gull with a broken wing. Filmed in glorious WiltshireVision by John Godwin, Craig is accompanied by Jesse Cutts on guitar and is filmed in some ‘old bloke’s workshop’. On the album version, violins and bassoon help paint the picture of Craig bobbing about rudderless – looking for a haven of some sort.
While all of what is mentioned above may lend an expectant weight to what follows, it’s quite the opposite. There is a brightness in the guitar motifs which skip along at a pace, at times playful and reminiscent of Nick Drake, with beautifully memorable lines like “I’m a pollinator looking for a flower / And i’m living in a mono-culture”. I fell for it on the first listen, helped by Fortnam’s pleasing vocals, which, as mentioned before on these pages, carries a passing resemblance to Robert Wyatt’s…a quirkily brilliant single that invites repeated plays.
German Ocean is also our Song of the Day.
Lyrics: German Ocean
Cast adrift, floating on the German Ocean,
Like a gull with a broken wing.
I’m looking for a haven –
Black as a dusty raven;
She’s the brightest of the birds she silhouette the sky.
I like it when she roll on by.
I’m a pollinator looking for a flower
And i’m living in a mono-culture.
I’m looking for a reason –
I need to think on this further;
I’m not the brightest of the workers I hang around all day.
I seem to with it get away.
Overboard with a compass and map;
Walking forward and looking back.
I’m looking for a reason.
I’m looking for that haven –
Black as a dusty raven;
She’s the brightest of the birds she silhouette the sky.
I can see her as I float on by.
‘Ark’ is released 16th July 2021 – Onomatopoeia Records