Ranging from ambient minimalism to world music, modern classical to jazz, Bob Holroyd’s music is often hard to pigeon hole. With nine studio albums and six remix albums to his name, Bob’s eclectic and texturally cinematic work has been recognised and remixed extensively by a huge range of artists such as Coldcut, Nitin Sawhney, Four Tet, Francois K, Mogwai, The Album Leaf, T. Williams, Lemonde, Loop Guru, Steve Roach and more, and has been used prominently in mainstream TV and films such as The Dark Knight, Lost, True Blood, The Sopranos, Panorama, Coast and many more.
Today, following on from his critically acclaimed 2018 album ‘The Cage’, Bob Holroyd has shared a minimalist video for his new single ‘Hiding In Plain Sight’. Drawing heavily from the world and influences around him, the new single takes on especially poignant meaning in the current social landscape.
Speaking about the single Bob says:
This new track is about isolation and loneliness. Even though we live in an ultra connected world, with more ways of communicating than ever before, lots of people are lonelier than ever. This is at it’s worst in large cities – even when surrounded by thousands of people often individuals know no-one, even their neighbours. The video is also meant to represent this. It’s a sort of dystopian cityscape from above where the odd pulse like signal shows that someone is trying to be heard or noticed, but because everything is all on such a massive scale it all get’s lost in the noise.
Over the course of his musical career Bob Holroyd has pioneered music that crosses musical and cultural boundaries, and as a result his music is influenced by a diverse array of sights, sounds from around the world. Bob’s music includes influences from extensive travels in Africa and Asia, and ranges from intense walls of percussive drumming – as on his cult club classic ‘African Drug’ – to delicate atmospheric soundscapes, such as the beautiful ‘Looking Back’ – a track recorded for the ‘Sanscapes’ project to highlight the plight of the Kalahari Bushmen, with whom he collaborated with. Similarly, he also recorded the Islamic Call to Prayer at Regent’s Park Mosque, writing a moving and dramatic piece around the haunting vocal by Yusuf Islam (formerly Cat Stevens).
With more recent releases such as his latest album ‘The Cage’, Bob looked to himself for inspiration. Citing work in therapy and exploring the complex textures and emotions that make up every moment of our lives as well as exploring the creative process itself as key elements of stimulus.
This raw and beguilingly honest approach can be heard instantly in the music itself. Transcendent ambient cogitations flow throughout his compositions, travelling from ruminating to wistful to uplifting and even a little perturbing at times. Fans of Eno, Laraaji, Max Richter and Peter Broderick will find much to love (Bob also names the likes of David Sylvian, Peter Gabriel, Arvo Part, Nils Petter Molvaer, Radiohead, Tavener and more as further influences).
With every release Bob Holroyd’s own brand of quiet sound collages grow not only in their multi-faceted compositions but also in their intelligent and thought-provoking non-verbal prose. Despite any potential preconceptions, Bob creates incredibly personal records, which are free from self-indulgence and pretension.
Whilst the concept behind his new single ‘Hiding In Plain Sight’ may focus on isolation, an almost osmotic aural connection can be found in the collective listening experience. On this new single Bob proves once again quite how much he is able to convey in his music, offering both a balm for stressful times and pause for thought in one deeply rewarding and minimally intricate listen.