Multi-instrumentalist Phil Cook released a surprise instrumental album, As Far As I Can See: Instrumental Recordings 2009 – 2019. The 13-track collection is available now digitally with a limited edition LP due on May 31.
Cook and Martin Anderson compiled the instrumental album that was mastered by Brian Joseph. The original recordings come from a variety of settings, including at Central Park School for Children in Durham, North Carolina, at The Cave in Chapel Hill and at Cook’s home studio. The set mixes previously released tracks with newly shared recordings. Cook stated:
This is a collection of snapshots. Recording “D.L.’s Holler” in the upstairs hallway of an elementary school, outside my wife’s classroom while she graded papers in a thunderstorm. Listen for the thunder roll in one of the breaks. Recording “Waiting Round The Oven Buns” in my house in January while my wife Heather, pregnant with our first child, napped in the front room. Driving hours in the wrong direction during a blizzard into Tennessee on Highway 40, making us four hours late for the recording session I had booked for his Side Up. Loading in wet and snowy and then loading out four hours later with my friends Nick and Yan, finished, victorious and laughing. Recording “Saratoga” with one son next to me flipping through Calvin and Hobbes and my other son napping just a room away. Sitting on an old front porch in Birmingham, Alabama one hot spring morning with James’ beat-up classical guitar and recording a quick voice memo as we were packing up to leave. Sharing a joint with my brother Brad on the way to The Cave in Chapel Hill and feeling grateful for the spontaneous virtuosity of the Canine Boys and Libby Rodenbough. These moments, stacked up in a pile, feel like the kind of riches nobody can ever take away from me. The truest currency. I hope you, dear listener, also share this currency and feel this gratitude when you think of the journey of moments that has formed you.
Stream Phil Cook’s surprise new album As Far As I Can See: Instrumental Recordings 2009 – 2019 below:
https://philcookmusic.bandcamp.com/album/as-far-as-i-can-see
