GTC DEBUT: BEN OSBORN – Letters from the Border (Nathan Micay Remixes)
Letters from the Border (Nathan Micay Remixes) available @ Apple Music.
by Walter Price
In April of this year, we were honored to premiere Ben Osborn’s weighty single “Letters from the Border”. In that review, it was said, “In a beautifully ominous soundscape reminiscent of works from Andrea Schroeder or Leonard Cohen, award-winning artist, Ben Osborn’s new single “Letters from the Border” laments on the unknown. Steeped in the songwriter’s Jewish lineage, Osborn remembers, “My ancestors came from Europe to the US before WWII. My great-grandfather was sending letters back to his family in Europe, but he didn’t know that they had already been killed. So he never received a reply to those letters.”
“And these lyrical sentiments, sadly, can easily be relatable in today’s increasingly uncertain and chaotic politized and social-media-driven world. Osborn’s absorption of the recording studio’s atmosphere and location, on the German-Polish border, as well his work with migrant and refugee musicians, at Berlin’s Open Music Lab, have also added weight to this hauntingly poignant track and forthcoming album.”
And now, Osborn returns with two stunning remixes of the track. Reworked by the mind of in-demand producer Nathan Micay. In a statement sent to GTC, the remixes are explained, “The British poet and songwriter Ben Osborn’s softly spoken lyrics, “When the fire swept over this continent / a host of sparrows rose from the broken things”, evoke a strange and broken world of migration and change. Nathan’s musical response oscillates from a driving, industrial darkness to moments of bright euphoria. In his, Schvitz Is A State of Mind Remix, Ben’s vocal cuts through the track throughout, while in the Rub a DUB Schvitztime Rremix it’s reduced to a ghostly echo in the distance.”
Check out the GTC Debut of the Micay Remixes, as well as the societally important original Osborn album, below.
Letters from the Border (Nathan Micay Remixes)
Remixes produced by Nathan Micay
Letters from the Border (album)
Written and performed by Ben Osborn
Produced and mixed by Alex Stolze
Additional vocals by Bethany Roberts
Additional electronics by Michael Bleach
Harp on Chedvah by Rowan Coupland
Clarinet on My Sister the Swimmer by Rachel Margetts
Mastered by Andreas Lupo Lubich at Calyx, Berlin
(Original) article cover foto by Andrea Huyoff, edited by GTC
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