Matthew Herbert’s New Big Band Project Protests Brexit
Matthew Herbert has announced a new big band project in response to Brexit. The two-year collaborative project is a trek across Europe “celebrating artistic and musical collaboration and communities across national borders,” according to the press release. The project starts in England when the UK government triggers Article 50, and then it runs parallel across Europe with concerts, recording sessions, and workshops. It all builds to an album, which will be released the same day that Britain leaves the EU in 2019.
The project launches with the Brexit Sound Swap, “a sound exchange scheme” that anyone anywhere can contribute to by recording and uploading a three-second sound bites. Once a user has contributed a sound, they automatically receive all of the sounds uploaded by other people. The purpose of the installation is to create a common resource of new and varied noises, free for everyone to use, hear, or download.
“In an increasingly fractured and divided political climate where tolerance and creativity are under threat, it feels like an important time to assert the desire for our bit of the musical community in Britain to reach out in solidarity with some of our closest, but soon to be less accessible, friends and neighbours,” Herbert says.
Last year, Herbert released A Nude (The Perfect Body), which was comprised of recordings of a nude body as it makes all kinds of sounds. Before that Herbert launched his “Edible Sound” series with a release pressed on a tortilla wrap. He continued the series in March, turning cheese, ham, aubergine, and more into edible records before showing off the collection at a show in London.
Read Pitchfork’s “5-10-15-20” interview with Matthew Herbert and “Glastonbury in the Time of Brexit.”
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