Petrels - All the colors of synthetic ambient

After the end of the post-rock experience with Bleeding Heart Narrative, few would have bet on the name Oliver Barrett. And yet, in less than a year, we found him churning out three albums that earned him a rightful place on the ever more crowded chessboard of synthetic ambient. All thanks to Petrels, an alter-ego born as a side project but which has quickly become the main vehicle for an inspiration drawing on many sources, condensed in this latest period into a personal, hard-to-classify sonic hybrid. We caught up with him to retrace together the triumph of this new skin.

I'm writing these questions the day after the release of "Mima", and I've just found out that another album is coming out in April, the third in less than a year! Is there a particular reason behind this such a rapid series of releases?

The new "album", "The Silver Chimney Club/Wat Tyler", is actually made up of two long pieces that I wrote and recorded last year. It's not an album in the same sense as Petrels' previous three, but I think the two tracks complete each other and work well as "sides" of the same coin. So I asked Denovali if they were interested in releasing it, and with their yes we arrived at the release, exactly as happened with the previous works. As for the rapid series of releases, I simply tend to carry forward several projects at once, so much so that last year I also released a series of self-produced cello works and an LP on Tartaruga Records under the name Glottalstop.

Did you work on each record separately, or do they both come from the same sessions?

The two tracks on the new work were written and recorded separately from “Mima“, but during the same period in which I was working on that record, so I suppose they come from a fairly similar perspective.

What's the concept behind “Mima”? I noticed a decidedly darker and more “mystical” atmosphere compared to “Onkalo”…

I think there really is more myth and more mysticism in “Mima”, although both are purely the product of my imagination. Whereas on “Haeligeweile” and “Onkalo” I tried to take real events and build mythic resonances outside of them, this time the intent was to start from exactly there, using those intertwinings as a starting point.

It's equally clear that you tried to dig much deeper into your sound, whereas in the past you'd stayed more “on the surface”…

Maybe, or it could simply be that I've grown more familiar with the sonic palette I've been using. I significantly increased the number of canvases I was painting on between “Haeligewielle” and “Onkalo”, and it was only on “Mima” that I managed to fully master all of them, so yes, it's likely that with these sounds I've gone down several layers closer to the heart of my sound.

What should we expect from the new album? Where are you headed this time?

“The Silver Chimney Club” was written to commemorate the death of my grandfather, Ernest Barrett, who passed away at the end of last year. Throughout his working life he travelled around as a civil engineer visiting countless factories and industries, and the Silver Chimney Club was a group he'd formed with some colleagues, with whom he'd meet up periodically, I suppose more for reasons of social activism than professional ones. I don't know what he would have made of this tribute, but I wanted to create something that combined the industrial world he was part of with the passion for music he passed on to me. He was a socialist and supported the Labour Party (the original post-war one, before Blair), another thing I inherited from him, and which ties into the second track. “Wat Tyler” takes its name from the leader of the 1381 English Peasants' Revolt, ostensibly a ferment born out of opposition to the poll tax, but which was in fact an undercurrent of a widespread desire for social change and the dismantling of the unbalanced and constricting socio-economic structures of the time. Despite early success, the revolt was quickly crushed and Wat Tyler was among its victims, killed by the Mayor of London on the accusation of having insulted the young King of England, Richard II, during a round of negotiations. More than six centuries on, precious little of what the rebelling peasants hoped would change has actually changed.

Your music is quite hard to classify: thinking of “Onkalo”, what comes to mind is a decidedly unprecedented mix of synthetic ambient, electroacoustic, post-rock derivations and even orchestral elements… What are your points of reference?

Talking about it honestly is quite complex, because a lot of the things that have inspired me in making the music I make actually have little or nothing to do with it on a sonic level. The relationship between the two is fairly abstract. And I can't think of anyone in particular to cite: I suppose the main guiding principle has always been to try and stay open to any new way of doing things, hoping that put like that it doesn't sound too vague.

When did you found Petrels, and on an artistic level, what did you want, and what do you still want, to pursue with this project?

Petrels started out as a solo side project outside of Bleeding Heart Narrative, a place where I could write without the constraints tied to the band's line-up. When I started working on the first album, I don't think I'd even thought about where I wanted to go or what direction to take, it all materialised, growing and evolving spontaneously. I think today I've definitely developed a certain sound and a certain approach, but I try never to make assumptions about what I do with Petrels, for fear of boxing myself in when it comes to understanding what it really is. I'm still working on the identity.

And what does it represent for you now? How do you see your music outside of Petrels?

I'm already involved in a few other projects outside of Petrels – for example Glottalstop, the alter-ego for my cello works – as well as in the role of writer and collaborator for other musicians. Petrels remains my main focus, though, and there are still plenty of tangents within it that keep expanding and developing.

How much of your music is composed, and how much is improvised?

When I record I generally start with a basic idea in mind for an initial combination of sounds or a rough structure, and from there I just let myself go, usually wrapping everything up pretty quickly. Whether the result matches my expectations or not – and most of the time it actually doesn't! – I always keep the same intention that was there in the initial idea, which is almost always quite vague. But this means the pieces aren't exactly improvised, they're always the product of a kind of direct-capture mechanism. I do like working fast though, especially to make room for surprises and unexpected turns that would be much harder to get, at least for me, if I worked too methodically and stuck to a script.

In 2012 you released a cassette under your own name… Why didn't it come out under the Petrels name?

That cassette, "Yowls", is a collection of cello improvisations originally released in a mini-edition of 50 copies by Econore. I decided to put it out under my own name because, being improvised, it sounded like something different, far removed from Petrels' usual territory. I've also released two other collections of the same kind, "Yauwls" and "Yuaols", through Bandcamp. I definitely could have, and still could, release everything under the Petrels name, but I've always worked on several projects in parallel and I like it that way.

Denovali is putting out everything you make, both full-lengths and shorter releases. What's your relationship with the label like, and how did you end up with them?

They got in touch with me after I'd released "Haeligewielle" on Tartaruga in a small first pressing, suggesting a vinyl repress. This new album ("The Silver Chimney Club/ Wat Tyler", ed.) will be the third one in total with them, and I think that's a pretty good result. Denovali works with incredible dedication, and even though they're based in another country, I can honestly say I've found it much easier to coordinate with them than with other British labels I've worked with in the past.

Your first album was a kind of "dress rehearsal" for the sound you'd go on to develop and refine… Were you still looking for the right direction to take?

Actually I already had a pretty clear idea of the sound I wanted for "Haeligewielle", but it was something very tied to the themes I was dealing with on the record, so honestly I didn't think much about what I'd do with it beyond simply bringing the two things together. The combination of strings, noise and electronics I used seemed to work well and gave me a lot of ideas about different directions to take afterwards, directions I suppose I'll keep experimenting with and developing for quite a while.

What instruments do you use in your performances? Which ones do you normally play yourself, and which do you leave to laptop or digital and artificial controls?

The main sound sources I use are cello and some cheap synthesizers. Every sound I start working with is acoustic or analogue, which I then modify or change after recording using digital software. There's no ideological reason behind working this way, it's just my current set-up. I've played cello since I was four years old, so it's the instrument I feel most comfortable with: I think the features of my music that depend on or stem from it are far more numerous than people realise when they listen.

As for Bleeding Heart Narrative, does the band still exist?

We made a decision towards the end of 2012: a lot of the members were about to leave for an indefinite period, so we felt the time had come to draw a line under it. Playing as a six-piece probably required a lot more energy than we were able to give at that point.

What do you carry with you today from that experience?

Well, the approach and the music are definitely different – Bleeding Heart Narrative was much more song-form based – but in terms of sound and writing there are a lot of similarities. Even in smaller elements – like writing for strings played alongside noise elements – I carry a lot of what I learned in those years with me. I'm sure I'll go back to working with lighter, more flexible sound structures at some point, but I suspect it won't be with Petrels. We'll see.

You've played quite a few times supporting hugely important artists… Do you think the stage is a dimension that can really bring out the best in your music?

Absolutely. I think a lot of what I'm currently doing with Petrels, in the form of quite a few elements, makes a lot more sense performed live than recorded in the studio. I also like the fact that, playing solo, I can decide to go somewhere with just my suitcase and make some noise. What I miss as an experience is playing together with other people, but that doesn't mean I won't get to try that dimension too, sooner or later.

When you're on stage, do you draw from your repertoire or do you give yourself over completely to improvisation?

It's roughly a 50/50 split between material I work out live and pre-recorded stuff that I just manipulate and adapt. So there's definitely a component of every set that I leave semi-free, but it changes from show to show. Some of the sound sources I use in the studio, like choirs and strings, are impossible to reproduce live, at least for an artist who plays solo and doesn't have much of a budget, so to replace them I happily use prepared loops.

In your upcoming live shows, will you be playing material from your latest work?

I'll probably draw from the tracklists of "Haeligewielle", "Onkalo" and "Mima", but it's just as likely I'll throw in something new.

To wrap up, is there any chance of seeing you in Italy?

I don't have any plans or confirmed dates at the moment, but I've wanted to come for a long time, so I think there's every chance it'll happen before too long!

Ride the wave of great music

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This article is an English translation of the original Italian text by Matteo Meda, published on OndaRock.it. It was translated with the help of artificial intelligence, under the editorial responsibility of OndaRock's editor-in-chief, Claudio Fabretti.

Read the original in Italian · About the English edition