Richard Barbieri remains one of contemporary music's most distinctive voices.
Hauntings is Barbieri's first studio album since 2021's Under A Spell, deepening the pensive, dark instrumental aesthetic of its predecessor. A diverse collection of immersive sound worlds, both dark and uplifting in equal measure, Hauntings is influenced by a nostalgia for the past and future and for things that didn't happen yet still manage to haunt the mind and soul. What is real and what is simulation?
The album finds Barbieri at the height of his powers, his deft keyboard and sonic architecture conjuring a shadowy, creeping Lovecraftian atmosphere. The music wanders through the streets of a gloomy lamp-lit Victorian London and drifts into grain-speckled snapshots of Belle Epoque Paris. These journeys into the past are contrasted with nihilistic but euphoric forays into the future, "Traveler" and "A New Simulation" bristling with the itchy modern anxiety that often runs through his best work. Contrasting the sound designs and electronics of Barbieri, the album features performances from renowned musicians Morgan Agren (drums and percussion), Percy Jones (bass guitar) and Luca Calabrese (trumpet).
