Stornoway

Before they soared back with the sky-scraping, heart-filling, life-giving kaleidoscopic wonder that is their fourth album, Dig The Mountain! – Stornoway did not exist. Formed in Oxford in 2005, the decade that followed saw the beloved, nature-celebrating band enjoy a slew of critically acclaimed releases, international tours and various memorable festival appearances.

Once the dust had settled, the band decided it was time to tune back into the natural landscape – allowing the project to become dormant after an extended run of farewell shows that concluded in 2017. Though the project had been laid to rest, and its various members now turning to new ventures, singer and guitarist Brian Briggs, keyboard player Jon Ouin and bassist Oli Steadman kept in touch, nourished by a friendship and musical kinship born out of their time together in Stornoway.

In 2020, when the world stopped, something stirred. Alone in his makeshift studio on a coastal hilltop, Briggs found himself inspired by the emptiness of the wilderness that surrounded him, as well as an insatiable desire to write music without the external pressures of a label or touring schedules – culminating in a series of collaborative songs written with his former bandmates that would eventually become new Stornoway material. The result is an immersive collection of songs that are both buoyant and windswept – occupying a liminal space between sea and land.