This is a new project for Spooky’s Duncan Forbes on 49North.

Together with internationally acclaimed violinist Jonathan Hill, the duo have produced a ten track album that is a blend of beautiful atmospheric electronica combined with analogue sonics, treated piano and live strings.

Each track is accompanied by an abstract film created by Matthew Le Maistre Smith alongside Duncan.

This is one for fans of Erased Tapes, Nils Frahm, Brian Eno and Hania Rani.

TRACK LISTING

A1. There Is Love
A2. In A Warm And Quiet Place
A3. Eagle On The Wind
A4. Equinox Rising
A5. Under A Big Sky
B1. Inner State
B2. In The Dunes
B3. Hourglass
B4. Ode To The Spirit Man
B5. Coming Home

"I love the idea of something being so romantic that it almost hurts," says C (for Chris) Duncan of the music he adores.

Glasgow's classically trained multi-instrumentalist and singer-songwriter honours that idea with tremendous reserves of panache and feeling on his fifth album, It's Only a Love Song, released through Bella Union on 24th January 2025. Flushed with swooning strings, enraptured images, classicist melodies and dreamy harmonies, it's a record of orchestral pop romanticism at its most sublime: one from the heart, warmed by a deep ache of constant yearning.

An expansive beauty of an album, the record is made all the more extraordinary by its homegrown gestation. Duncan wrote and played most of it himself at his home studio (he also did the artwork) in Helensburgh, an experience suited to his sense of care and craft. "If you want to spend ages working on one tiny sound and then do a broad sweep of something else, it doesn't matter because the time is yours. I'm not paying for studios, which works for me because I go from having intense periods of working to spending ages making a snare drum sound a bit nicer. It'll take days to do, but it's good."

The result is Duncan's most lush release, and a fresh peak in a dazzling creative arc. Born in Glasgow, he played in school bands before studying music composition at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland. His haunting debut album, Architect (2015), banked a Mercury Music Prize nomination; its follow-up, the Twilight Zone-inspired The Midnight Sun (2016), reached the shortlist for the Scottish Album of the Year. A tour with Elbow then beckoned, after which Duncan recorded the richly melodic Health (2019) at Elbow's Salford studio with Craig Potter. Another entry on the shortlist for Scottish Album of the Year came accompanied by effusive reviews: throughout his career, Duncan has banked raves from The Guardian, NME, MOJO, Uncut and others, alongside much love from BBC Radio 6 Music.

Besides support slots with Belle & Sebastian and Elbow, Chris went on to fill sizable venues in his own name, including London's Union Chapel and Scala. Another career development beckoned in 2020 via a collaboration with Bella Union's Simon Raymonde for the Lost Horizons project on the song 'Circle', prefiguring the effortless-seeming breeziness of Alluvium. It's Only a Love Song is his next great leap forward, a heartfelt valentine to romance with its head in the heavens and its sweep in the cinema stalls. Alongside The Carpenters and Scott Walker, declared influences range from Michel Legrand to Bernstein's West Side Story and the films of Jacques Demy, whose The Umbrellas of Cherbourg boasts music to make hearts sing. "It's almost hyper-romantic, which I love," explains Chris: "That way in music where you get to a point where your heart can't actually take anymore." Radiant and rapturous, It's Only a Love Song takes you right there.

TRACK LISTING

It's Only A Love Song
Lucky Today
Triste Clair De Lune
Worry
The Space Between Us
Think About It
Delirium
Sadness
Surface Of A Fantasy
Reprise
Time And Again

Duncan Forbes returns to 49North with a super fresh sounding 4 track EP, all killer no filler!

First up is ‘Moods Shift And Flicker’ which effortlessly fuses Duncan’s love of Detroit and dub techno with his love of Chicago house music and spoken word all underpinned by an infectious disco bassline. Following on and taking things up a level or two we are treated to the uplifting peak time monster that is ‘Time Is Now!’. Peak time melodic techno that will be just as at home in any large open-air space as it will in a dark basement. Third on the menu is ‘Spectra’, a no holes barred sonic battle weapon that will take you to the stars and back as it builds and builds. Desert is served up in the form of ‘I Wanna Know’, a solid 808 electro workout with one foot in the 80’s and the other somewhere in the future.

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Neon-lit deepness from Duncan Forbes who channels dub techno, Chicago house and Detroitian sensibilities for a dreamy doozy of a club record.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Moods Shift And Flicker
A2. Time Is Now!
B1. Spectra
B2. I Wanna Know

49North revisit Duncan Forbes’ debut solo album ‘Return Of The Strobelight Kid’ with three wonderfully fresh takes on three different tracks from the album.

First up we have Kassian who tackles ‘Floating’ and they step up to the mark with grace and turn in a peak time, hypnotic, yet melodic, tech house groover that will lget any dancefloor simmering red hot. 

Next Borai takes on ‘Another World’ and using the sweeping analogue strings from the original he lets them soar over funk fuelled shuffling hats and clattering snares. He draws you in gently and when the bass drops, buckle up for theride!

The third and final remix comes from none other than Legowelt. His no holes barred high energy take on ‘Serendipity’ is full of analogue warmth and grabs you right from the start. Layers of electro charged arpeggiated lines fuse with the strings from the original underpinned by a driving rhythm to propel you forward into the future and beyond.

STAFF COMMENTS

Matt says: Most likely gonna fly due to the in-demand Kassian remix. Really feeling Borai and Legowelt's contributions on this too. If you've got laser-guided dancefloors in your sights, then look no further.

TRACK LISTING

A1. Floating (Kassian Bio Remix)
B1. Another World (Borai Remix)
B2. Serendipity (Legowelt Remix)

The inception of 49North marks the beginning of a brand new era for Duncan Forbes; who most emphatically made his mark on the WW scene as one half of legendary duo - Spooky - alongside Charlie May; releasing a string of landmark singles and albums over 3 decades, not to mention timeless remix / production work for International heavyweights like Depeche Mode, M83, Sasha, William Orbit, Mr.G and Apparat.

On Side A of this very special, 3rd and final ‘49North - Phase 1: Distilled & Amplified’ LP Sampler - we see Duncan's close compadre, Mr. G, flip 'The Next Step' into a killer slice of deep and kinetic, psych-tinged Techno; before the Phoenix G boss steps up to the plate once again, to kick off the flipside - distilling 'Bluer Than Blue' down into one super-tight, swing-loaded roller; topped off with a seductive whispered vocal, skating rides and a perfectly-poised low-end lead. And then, to fittingly wrap up this three-pronged 12” attack, we have an out-and-out gem from Mr. Forbes himself… as we see him transform, 'When Lightning Strikes Twice' - into a pulsing, beyond widescreen - Motor City meets The White Isle - colossus.

TRACK LISTING

A1. ‘The Next Step’ (Mr. G’s ‘Tears Of Gratitude’ Dub)
B1. ‘Bluer Than Blue’ (Mr. G’s ‘Time To Sweat’ Remix)
B2. ‘When Lightning Strikes Twice’ (Duncan’s ‘Lost In The Moment’ Remix)

You probably already know Duncan as a founding member of Maximo Park, but here he brings us a rather wonderful collection of his solo work: Beautifully understated, melodic pop songs.

More about the album from Duncan...

'Early last year in that strange sort of limbo of a time, I was releasing songs on Bandcamp as & when I’d finished messing around with them. It was kind of therapeutic to work as a musician in a more spontaneous way, no deadline or pressure other than to create songs that were a standard I was happy with and as a reaction to whatever was happening at that point. I started to build an album of these songs with no planned finishing point, making music to escape the strange days. Around the same time I received a message from Tom at Reveal Records asking if I’d like to release a compilation of my solo work. I already knew of Reveal Records as it is based back in my home town of Derby but even though we had lost touch over the years, I remembered Tom had been an enthusiastic early supporter of Maximo Park (we played a couple of in store sessions at his record shop around our first two albums). In fact our paths had crossed way before that even because I used to go into his shop as a young kid in the 90’s (saving up my pennies to buy records by Sonic Youth and Pixies and U.S. import Lemonheads t shirts). That all informed my path to becoming a musician so it feels fitting & fortunate that things have come full circle & we are now working together.

After going through the songs, we came up with, Green Grows Devotion. A collection of selected songs written & recorded all over the place and spanning nearly 12 years of writing.

The collection travels through a mixture of styles, veering from spacey experimental ideas to quieter acoustic songs, one, “Cathedral Doors”, was written shortly after I lost my Dad & pushed me further to explore my own self sufficiency and sound, from the rawer punk spirited to the sparser & psychedelic ones.

The recordings vary from lo-fi home recordings to full band recordings done in rehearsals spaces with a handful of microphones. Some of the songs are from short run albums I’ve released myself, some are unreleased & some are from EPs or singles I’ve put out leading right back to 2010 when I started. It's been exciting to hear them come out of the dark & cathartic to sequence them all like this on the new album.

Hope you enjoy listening.

TRACK LISTING

Branca Drive
Heads Of The Bastille
Red Moon
Freak Facade
Dear O
Cathedral Doors (Transit IV)
Historic Elements
Impossible To Define
Outside Notion (Featuring Sarah Suri)
Sam (Demo #2)
Filler In The Bodywork
A Chime

‘Alluvium’ is the fourth album from C Duncan, Glasgow’s classically trained multi-instrumentalist and singer-songwriter, released through Bella Union. After the haunting raptures of Architect (2015), the Twilight Zone-inspired reveries of The Midnight Sun (2016) and the richly melodic Health (2019), Alluvium is a sublime palate-refresher for Duncan (C for Christopher), brimming with revitalised fluency: a warming dispatch from the daylight zone, if you like.

TRACK LISTING

Air
Heaven
We Have A Lifetime
Bell Toll
Lullaby
Torso
Pretending
You Don’t Come Around
I Tried
Sad Dreams
Alluvium
Earth
The Wedding Song
Upon The Table

The Phantom Band guitarist, Duncan Marquiss's instrumental solo (ad)venture finds electronic guitar manipulations intertwine with wandering acoustic ambience. With one foot in 1970s Germany and the other in the woods, rivers and mountains of northeast Scotland.

“I like it when music builds itself up in an organic fashion,” says Duncan Marquiss. “When it just seems to emerge and almost writes itself.”
This natural, intuitive and free flowing approach is evident all across the debut solo album from the multi-disciplinary artist. From tender yet sweeping acoustic moments to experimental electronic guitar manipulations, the album feels like a ceaselessly sprawling exploration of texture and tone. Despite veering into what sounds like electronic ambient soundscapes, the entire album is rooted in the guitars. “I enjoy trying to stretch the guitar as an instrument,” says Marquiss. “That reflects my playing style, always trying to make the guitar sound different, or create non-guitar like sounds.”

Marrying earthy, textural acoustic instrumentals that feel rooted in open landscapes, with those that capture the pulse and hum of a populated metropolis (Marquiss resides in Glasgow). The album was recorded in Aberdeenshire in Marquiss’ parents' garage. “Apart from the wind and the swallows nesting in the eaves there’s not many distractions around,” he says. This is a solo record that goes right to the very essence of Marquiss as an artist. The expansive yet intimate sounds he’s created here stem from the same peaceful isolation of where it all began.

There’s a cosmic touch tracing back to 1970s Germany (Michael Rother solo, Cluster, Harmonia, Popul Vuh soundtracks) that infiltrates much of the album, alongside some of its more pastoral textures, with Marquiss citing a wide range of listening habits. These include Bruce Langhorne's The Hired Hand, Jim O Rouke's Bad Timing, Arthur Russell and Laurie Spiegel.

Despite containing no lyrics, the album feels rooted in narrative and development. As the album unfolds the acoustic guitar becomes more prominent over the electric, almost as if nature is slowly taking back and growing over abandoned human-made structures. A record that, despite being experimental in tone and essence, retains a very human and natural touch throughout. 

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Marquiss' solo record sees the Phantom Band guitarist pulling out a soaring selection of expansive ambient melodies skilfully wrought out of the guitar, resulting in an evocative and hypnotic selection of 70's synth influenced neo-folk gems.

TRACK LISTING

SIDE A
1. Drivenhalle
2. C Sweeps
3. Fixed Action Patterns
SIDE B
4. Tracks
5. Murmer Double
6. Wires Turned Sideways In Time
7. Minor History