Zach Condon, aka Beirut, has shared a new and unreleased track from his upcoming album Artifacts.
Fyodor Dormant is from the forthcoming double-LP’s worth of music tracing the evolution of Beirut from a 14-year old Condon’s first attempts at bringing the music he heard in his mind to life.
The song can be found on Side B: Misfits from the first record of the anthology. Condon explains the story behind the teenage creation of this song.
“I don’t know if people who hear most of my music would know immediately how much I loved synthesizers as a teenager. I saw them as a welcome escape from the then electric-guitar-dominated music of the States and the UK, before I was exposed to the broader spectrum of music outside of these narrow walls.
“I still sneak synths in around the corners of most albums, sometimes heavily, sometimes subtly. I now have access to some beautiful and unique analog systems, but back then, I had a barely functioning, shared-by-the-whole-house PC with a pirated copy of fruity loops, and I wanted to make music that could make me get off the wall and move a little, at least in my imagination.”
“I was an often lonely and isolated teenager and rarely if ever found friends as obsessive and similar-minded about music as myself, so starting a band always ended up seeming more or less out of the question. This was my first experience being able to arrange for all parts with ease, and starting to craft sounds from simple wave shapes into something with character was an exciting endeavor that I still enjoy.
“It was on songs like this one that I started adding the acoustic instruments back into the mix, using a piano that was moved into the house that I fell in love with, and my dear companion the trumpet. It was from about this time at 16 years of age and on that I slowly began to shed the training wheels of the computer program and wander deeper and deeper into the unknown sonic territory of Farfisa organs, accordions and ukuleles.”
Artifacts began as a means of compiling a few early Beirut EPs for a proper physical release. However, as Condon explains in the album’s excellent liner notes, reconnecting with old recordings through fresh ears turned a simple re-issue project into something much more expansive.
“When the decision came to re-release this collection, I found myself digging through hard drives looking for something extra to add to the compilation. What started as a few extra unreleased tracks from my formative recording years quickly grew into an entire extra records-worth of music from my past, and a larger project of remixing and remastering everything I found for good measure.”
Artifacts will be released digitally on January 28 and physically on March 4 via Condon’s Pompeii Records.
Source: Media release
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