Jon Gomm, the UK based acoustic guitar virtuoso, who recently announced details of his new album The Faintest Idea, due for release on Kscope on 16th October 2020 has shared the video for new single ‘Cocoon’. Filmed by The Samsara Collective in the stunning setting of Niamos Radical Arts Theatre, Manchester, the video captures the immersive and emotional quality of Jon’s music.
Jon comments on the meaning behind ‘Cocoon’, ‘Love and fear is a potent mix. When you love someone and feel a desperate need to keep them safe, it can make it very hard to judge risk. When you struggle with your own anxiety, your judgement is doubly untrustworthy. You see every slip they make before it happens, whether it ever really happens or not. You imagine every loss of grip your own faithless hands would tremor at, but it scares you twice as much.
Eventually, you turn into the source of risk. The hysterical monologue of your own cowering familiar becomes the thing you most need to protect them from. At best, you stifle the one you love. At worst, you make them you. If you are a cocoon for another person, remember that the most important job a cocoon has, is to break open and let the being inside it go free. So watch them take flight, feel your stomach sink as they stutter and lurch, and shut the fuck up unless they need you.’
When most people look at an acoustic guitar, they see exactly that – a wooden box with strings. As one of the pioneers of the modern fingerstyle sound, however, Jon Gomm has a rare gift for turning one instrument into what feels like an entire orchestra…
The Blackpool-born singer-songwriter’s 2003 home-recorded debut, Hypertension, was nothing short of a musical revelation: drumming beats, tapping chords and striking harmonics on his acoustic underneath that warm, soulful voice.
Things changed for Jon with landmark single Passionflower racking up millions of views of YouTube and other media platforms in 2012 – with British legend Stephen Fry describing him on mainstream television as someone “playing the guitar in a way I’d never seen it played before” and “an all-round genius”. Follow up album Secrets Nobody Keeps arrived in 2013, further cementing his stature as one of the driving forces behind an acoustic revolution – but now, having signed a label deal for the very first time in his career, he’s managed to truly refine the pop sensibilities and emotive expression within that unmistakable wall of sound. Latest full-length The Faintest Idea is set for release this October.
Third album Secrets Nobody Keeps arrived in 2013, further cementing his stature as one of the driving forces behind an acoustic revolution – but now, have signed a label deal for the very first time in his career, he’s managed to truly refine the pop sensibilities and emotive expression within that unmistakeable wall of sound. Latest full-length The Faintest Idea is set for release this October.
Perhaps one of the greatest surprises with The Faintest Idea is how it contrasts the incredible human warmth of Gomm’s acoustic articulation with more icy affairs, thanks to the synth parts and production work from Australian musician Andy Sorenson. Instead of a war between man and machine, the collaboration delicately cross-pollinates simple honesty with more forward-thinking atmospheres. It is a contemporary masterpiece – rich in its sense of paths travelled and roads taken, while also daring to gaze into the unexpected future.
The album earned its title through the notion that all of us, to some extent, are just The Faintest Idea. The singer/guitarist notes how that everything is made out of vibrating strings of probability, and it’s this pseudo scientific and spiritual meaning – as well as the more literal translation of total guesswork – that felt like the perfect summation of album number four… “It’s an enigmatic title,” smiles Gomm. “There’s a fine line between a metaphor and a pun, so I guess it dances on that.”
The album is complimented by the delicate hand drawn pen and ink cover art created by Lee Zimmerman.
The Faintest Idea is due to be released on 16th October on CD, double LP, digital and as a stunning limited edition deluxe 3 disc hardback book edition which will feature – CD1 – The Faintest Idea album, CD 2 – The Naked Artist Mix – a stripped back version of the album; a DVD containing 6 exclusive performances filmed in a medieval church, guitar technique presentations, a 35 minute Jon Gomm interview, song description videos and The Faintest Idea in high resolution stereo audio. The beautiful book will feature Lee Zimmerman illustrations, song descriptions, hand written lyrics and full track tablature for the song “Check You’re Still Breathing”. All formats are available to pre-order HERE (https://jongomm.lnk.to/TheFaintestIdea)
The Faintest Idea – UK & Eire headline tour
tickets on sale now with album and ticket bundles available HERE (https://jongomm.lnk.to/TheFaintestIdea)
December 2020
Sat 5 – Huddersfield – Parish Pub
Sun 6 – York – The Crescent
Thu 10 – Trowbridge – Emmanuels Yard
Fri 11 – Cheltenham – Frog And Fiddle
Sat 12 – Swansea – Sin City
Jan 2021
Mon 4 – Southampton – Joiners
Tue 5 – Brighton – Komedia
Wed 6 – Bury St Edmunds – Apex
Fri 15 – Nottingham – Rescue Rooms
Sat 16 – Bristol – Thekla
Sun 17 – Birmingham – Hare & Hounds
Fri 22 – Manchester – The Bread Shed
Sat 23 – Liverpool – Leaf
Fri 29 – Leeds – Brudenell
Feb 2021
Wed 3 – Runcorn – Brindley Theatre
Fri 5 – Milton Keynes – Craufurd Arms
Sat 6 – Haverhill – Haverhill Arts Centre
Sun 7 – Reading – Sub 89
Thu 11 – Cardiff – The Globe
Fri 12 – Blackpool – Bootleg Social
Thu 18 – Preston – The Ferret
Fri 19 – Newcastle – Cluny
Sat 20 – Glasgow – Oran Mor
Sat 27 – Dublin – Academy 2
March 2021
Fri 5 – London – Bush Hall
Sat 6 – Guildford – Boileroom
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