benedict

Per a newspaper article published today, Thomas Dolby accomplished a great deal when he stopped performing:

" [...] The British pop boffin sparked attention in the early 1980s, with innovatively catchy smash hits including She Blinded Me With Science and Hyperactive!, vividly quirky albums such as 1988’s Aliens Ate My Buick, and production for multi-genre artists from Def Leppard to Joni Mitchell.

By the early 1990s, Dolby had swapped music for the technology hotbed of California’s Silicon Valley.

Now he’s back in Britain and set to release his first studio album in two decades, A Map Of The Floating City.

‘A lot of people never expected me to return to music,’ admits Dolby, steering us through unmarked country lanes.

‘When I stopped making records, the internet was just emerging and I’d find online groups discussing my songs. 'I felt like someone who got bigger after he died.’

It seems this musical futurist has found a rural retreat. Next to Dolby’s home (which he shares with his US actress wife Kathleen Beller and children) is his beautiful studio: a converted lifeboat named The Nutmeg Of Consolation.

Inside, there’s reclaimed mahogany, vintage naval equipment and solar-powered synths and computers.

A Map Of The Floating City comprises three EPs: the first, Amerikana, was available to Dolby’s online fanbase, the Flat Earth Society; the latest, Oceanea, is an expansive, emotional work that echoes this environment.

‘Oceanea is about that moment when you come into this eco-zone,’ says Dolby.

‘I’m not really a city person and it’s rather nice being governed by the wind and sun.’

Dolby has never remained rooted in one style but Oceanea’s title track (featuring folk vocalist Eddi Reader) notably sounds more literary than electronic.

‘I’ve liked the way that novelists can set each work in a new geographical location,’ he explains.

‘I’m at my most excitable when I’m doing something unexplored. When I started out, few people were making entire pop records with electronics. I had a natural inclination towards rich instrumentation.

'Each time something new came along – videogames, virtual reality, the internet – I thought I’d like to mess with that and define what it can be.’

Few artists seem quite as transatlantic as Dolby (‘I’ve always had a romance with aspects of America’), and hardly any have thrived equally in the spotlight and as a session player.

He’s naturally full of superstar anecdotes, like rehearsing for the Grammys with Stevie Wonder or landing at Live Aid in David Bowie’s helicopter [...] "

I can't see a release date on Amazon but it looks like the publicity campaign is up and running!

cdollaz

I caught one of his gigs about 3-4 years ago. Decent, but it's really hard to pull off a one-man show.

statcat

I never really cared for what he did after Golden Age of Wireless so much. I would see him live though if I had the chance.

Numanoid

^ Essentially the same here. But those first couple of albums are grand.

gmanca

Well, Golden Age of Wireless is the first album; he had an EP released before but it was that followed by The Flat Earth.

I rather enjoy his first three albums, The Flat Earth has some very timeless work on it; I would like to see him work with Intrada Soundtracks on releasing a complete soundtrack/score to Howard the Duck.