Wired For Sound

A lot has changed since North Atlantic Oscillation released their last album, the well-stocked Grind Show, in 2018. After a strange five years it feels somewhat reassuring to see the return of the electronic post-prog outfit, and it's now effectively a one-man band as Sam Healy leads the way. Prog catches up with the musician to find out more.

- Chris Cope

You wouldn't know it from the surface, but every time Sam Healy releases new music, he's tinged with self-doubt. Imposter syndrome, the North Atlantic Oscillation main man says. And this time around, that nagging worry has been exacerbated by a five-year wait between albums.

"At some point you're going to write your last good album," the musician says from his home in Edinburgh. "Everyone is going to do that at some point. The question is: is it the last one? That's the worry."

Judging by United Wire, the latest album from the forward-thinking electronic prog outfit, the multiinstrumentalist need not worry. It's been half a decade since the last record, 2018's beguiling Grind Show, and the project - NAO are effectively a one man-show with Healy at the helm continues to be in fine fettle.

For United Wire, the title of which was inspired by a company name on the side of a building the musician would see on cycles during lockdown, North Atlantic Oscillation continue the journey through dreamy prog, electronic textures and masses of melancholic melody. The only 'real' instrumentation here are vocals, electric and acoustic guitar and clarinet, with the rest - including the trademark layered, velvety soundscapes - conjured through the wonders of technology. The first single released from the record, for instance, was Matryoshka, a track that swells with chaotic, Squarepusher-esque electronic intensity before dissolving into a serene sense of melancholic calm that would be a snug fit on a modern-day Radiohead record.

"You can enter a weird set of space that's simultaneously very precise and crystalline but also feels kind of chaotic as well," Healy says of electronic music. "That's a pleasing place for me."