Manchester-based outfit Caulbearers announces the release of their debut album ‘Come Back Home’ on October 30th, their latest collaboration featuring ethereal folk artist Ruth Blake. The band’s first major release since their 2011 EP ‘More Lie Deep’, there are ten tracks on offer, sounding a rallying call for unity at the grassroots level and resistance to the forces intent on dividing us.
Apart from the band members themselves, this release involves several high-profile professionals, including Seadna McPhail (Badly Drawn Boy, Jah Wobble, Everything Everything, I Am Kloot, Happy Mondays), who handled the mixing. Recorded by Mahoney and Chris Hamilton at Toast Recordings and Seadna McPhail at Airtight Studio, this album was mastered by Jim Spencer (New Order, Johnny Marr, Charlatans, Factory Floor) at Eve Mastering.
A collective formed in 2007 and led by Damien Mahoney, Caulbearers are known for blending diverse musical styles, including soul, funk, hip-hop, indie pop, dub, nu jazz and folk influences. With contributors hailing from around the UK and Europe, their DIY ethic has coursed through every element of their releases, from design, production, videos and gigs to the recording process itself.
The lead track ‘Brothers At The Wheel’ traces a journey of political awakening – from a naive plea for those in power to change course before disaster hits, to disillusionment at hollow words and empty promises that leave the status quo.
The accompanying video presents an uncompromising challenge to the power structures governing modern life, while ultimately offering solidarity and collective action as an alternative to despair. Exploring “the wheel” as a machine built to continually turn for profit and power regardless of the cost to people, communities and the planet, visual artist Latent Variables blends animation, photography and video to reflectthe different stages and emotions of this epic song.
An important motif in the video is the breaking apart of everything we know; people, environments, plants and buildings shatter, with the notion that we have to consciously bring these pieces back together to heal and to create something new.
Collaborating with Manchester MC, poet and reggae artist J Chambers, Damien Mahoney filmed original footage around his neighbourhood to epitomise the song’s major themes. Locations with abandoned and boarded up buildings contrast with colourful murals by local artists.
“I see the two murals featured in the video almost every day as they are really close to my house. They bring a much-needed display of beauty, nature and hope in what is a very urban environment. I live in a very multi-cultural area and I feel that both the song and the video express the notion that a shared struggle exists for many people, which echoes in other streets, other words, other languages,” says Damien Mahoney.
With an unrelenting groove, strings, bass, and keys are locked into a single insistent pattern.. Past the tempo shift, the song opens into a second movement: a soaring, wordless lament by Ruth Blake — a beautiful and mournful, yet defiant, celebration of the human spirit. Underneath, the arrangement builds in waves — guitars layering, cello and violin rising, keys, bass and drums gathering weight — swelling to a crescendo before dissolving.
‘Brothers At The Wheel’ is available everywhere digitally, including Spotify, Apple Music and Bandcamp, capturing the awakening in full — appeal, disillusionment, and the turn toward unity. Caulbearers’ ‘Come Back Home’ album is out October 30th via Single Cell Recordings.
TRACK LIST
01 . Harpses
02 . Truth
03 . Next World
04 . Over Comes A Cloud
05 . Paths
06 . Twisted Cord
07 . Small Space
08 . Brothers At The Wheel
09 . Burst Through The Borders
10 . Once Inseparable