Faris Badwan and John Coxon announce collaborative 12”

Set for release on 5th February, Faris Badwan and John Coxon have announced a collaborative 12” featuring two tracks ‘Boiling Point’ and ‘Promise Land’.

The first release of an ongoing collaborative series between Faris and other artists, the pair first met when Faris was looking for producers for his solo material, eventually evolving into something more improvisational and instinctive.

As Faris explains, “The new songs we ended up working on were largely spontaneous and cut together from early takes with minimal overdubbing. The lyrics were improvised and the focus was placed more on creating atmosphere and keeping things fairly raw and expressive. I guess I found it rewarding particularly with the guitar playing because it was so intuitive and completely free from any expectations of how a song should be constructed. There are hooks and repetitive sections but fewer traditional structures.

“We tried to avoid doing any planning beforehand and focussed more on responding to what was happening in the moment. I guess the sessions were kind of a constant dialogue where we would each respond to the other’s improvisation.

“With ‘Promise Land’ I began by improvising lyrics over a drone track John and I created. Some time later I came across ‘To Our Land’ by Mahmoud Darwish, a Palestinian poet, and was struck by the similarities - there are a few lines that match really closely. Despite being half-palestinian myself this was a total accident and I know for sure I hadn’t seen Darwish’s piece before.

“With ‘Boiling Point’ the lyrics are almost the ghost of a narrative rather than an explicit story. I’m interested in the subconscious and how the hidden parts of your brain express themselves when given the opportunity. Looking back it was almost more about creating the right conditions for the subconscious to come out.”

Set for release on 5th Feb, you can pre-order the 12” here.