Release Date: Jul 5, 2022
Blur drummer Dave Rowntree is very pleased to share his first solo single, London Bridge.
The track is streaming now via Cooking Vinyl and produced with Leo Abrahams (Wild Beasts/Brian Eno/Ghostpoet). It heralds the start of an exciting new project for Rowntree, over three decades since Blur formed back in 1989.
London Bridge is an enticing opening statement. Deceptively bright and upbeat, with its staccato ‘la-la-la-la’ hook line, the music belies a lyrical sense of dread. As proficient with a synth or guitar as he is behind the drum-kit, Rowntree’s innate ear for a melody is given free-reign on this scuzzy but impactful, lo-fi number.
Rowntree: “When I was in my early 20s, in Colchester, I would start to see the number 126 everywhere. I lived at a house that was 126, I’d get a bus that was 126. It felt to me that the universe was trying to alert my attention to 126 for some reason, even though the rational part of me knew that that was bollocks.
“So, ‘London Bridge’ was one of those,” he adds. “Things just started happening when I was near London Bridge, or going past on the bus, or on the tube going underneath London Bridge. I would just notice events occurring, and it was unsettling.
“I had to confront my London Bridge demons and that’s what the song is about.”
“I’m really excited to release my first single as a solo artist. It’s from a body of work that I’ve been putting together over the last couple of years, and I’m humbled to be releasing it on the legendary Cooking Vinyl label.
As well as seasoned multi-instrumentalist and the longstanding drummer of one of Britain’s most successful bands, Dave’s also something of a polymath. A film and TV composer (credits include Netflix series The One and the BBC technological crime thriller The Capture), podcaster, light aircraft pilot (and instructor), lawyer, and former Labour councillor.
London Bridge heralds Dave Rowntree’s next move. There is much more to come.
| 03. London Bridge | 3:19 |
