Colin Harper’s Titanium Flag
Adapted from the PR material to accompany the re-promotion of the CD in Summer 2011.
A long time ago, in a galaxy far away, Colin Harper used to write about music. The track-record of such people becoming musicians is far from good and yet, and yet… a couple of books, a few hare-brained schemes and 10 years down a blind alley later (accepting a job in the public sector and trying ever since to get out of it), he is quietly chuffed to be finding a genuine and growing interest in his music.
In 2007, after years of his songs quietly appearing on other people’s records – including collaborations with Bert Jansch, Brian Houston, Brooks Williams and Martin Hayes - he collected a bunch of his songs and instrumental pieces together on a CD credited to The Field Mouse Conspiracy. Irish music bible Hot Press declared, “Music journalist can write songs shock! This collection makes you wonder why Harper didn’t turn poacher much sooner…” Hi Fi News caught the vibe perfectly: “Right here you’ll find the long-lost spirit of music making for the sake of making music.”
Harper imagined that would be it for his spare-time musical adventures: the tidying up of loose ends, the closing of a door. He looked forward to building matchstick cathedrals in quiet obscurity. But three years later the muse came knocking…
At Christmas 2009 he took a friend’s advice, borrowed some money and bought, for the first time in my life, a really fine instrument: a handmade Avalon acoustic guitar. It’s been a revelation and a catalyst. Having created no music – barely picked up an instrument – for two years, the instrumental pieces for Titanium Flag and also a host of vocal pieces (some of which were subsequently released on CD as Rust) ’came’ really quickly. It was quite a cathartic experience, but that’s only on a personal level – the music stands alone, failing or succeeding on its own merits.
In August 2010 Titanium Flag slipped out. An all-instrumental CD, veering between chamber music, folk-blues, progressive rock and cool jazz, it was inspired by two books on Arctic history and travel: Joanna Kavenna’s The Ice Museum: In Search Of The Lost Land Of Thule (Viking, 2005) and True North: Travels In Arctic Europe (Polygon, 2008) by Gavin Francis. Joanna was kind enough to allow the use of her title, and both authors have loved the music too.
The CD has been sent to only a handful of broadcasters and yet the reaction has been an inspiration – with airplay ongoing, and listeners getting in touch as a result. Musically, it has been inspired by artists ranging from Keith Jarrett to Arvo Part, Martin Carthy to the Mahavishnu Orchestra, with instruments used including clarinet, flugelhorn, piano, string quartet and Hammond organ. Plus guitars… Most airplay has focused on the gentle tracks, but even the title track, a pulverising 12 minute prog-rock epic, has been played at least twice on air. Humbling…. and quite baffling at the same time!
Brush Shiels, founder of Irish prog-rock legends Skid Row, said: “There is so much energy coming off Titanium Flag that it has to be contributing to global warming! In some small way you will definitely affect people who care about the state of our planet, which is something that Skid Row never did. Beautiful piece of work.”
Former Mojo editor and acclaimed author Paul Du Noyer got in touch to say: “I am thoroughly enjoying this music – some new texture, or feeling, strikes me with each listen.”
Horslips keyboard/flute legend Jim Lockhart phoned to say how much he was enjoying the album and that it had inspired him to focus on composing more music himself.
Folk/blues maestro Brooks Williams emailed: “The tunes are indeed beautiful – very spatial and evocative! The guitar sounds fab!”
Former Focus guitarist Jan Akkerman – a major inspiration for the album – took the time to critique every track in detail, declaring ‘Rachelle’ “beautiful”, ‘The Last Place On Earth’ as “my thing – great!” and ‘To Sail For Eternity’ “a masterpiece”.
As a result, the album was re-pressed in 2011.
Titanium Flag is available in physical and download forms at:
http://cdbaby.com/cd/ColinHarper along with iTunes, Amazon and other online retailers.
Text from the CD Insert
Physical copies of Titanium Flag come with a textual insert of credits and track notes. For anyone who downloads the album and wants this information, here it is:
The Ice Museum Suite (Tracks 1-7)
Six Days North - In 325 BC Pytheus of Massila became the first writer from what was then the civilised world to explore the North Atlantic, sailing around Britain and north past the Shetlands. ‘Six days north’ of Britain he discovered a populated place – never identified with any certainty by subsequent commentators – which he named Ultima Thule.
Years Of Regret - Like many written works from the ancient world, Pytheus’ book, On The Ocean, is lost to posterity, known only from a handful of quoted fragments and sceptical remarks in the surviving works of subsequent Greek and Roman geographers. His mysterious land ‘beyond the north wind’ grew into a totem of mythand yearning, implicated as the spurious source of the Nazis’ master race concept. It has remained a metaphor for something mysterious and wonderful that is always just beyond reach.
Frozen Ocean - In Pytheas’ words, a day’s sailing beyond Thule the sea congealed.
To Sail For Eternity - During the 6th Century AD, according to the later ‘immram’ of his voyage – a medieval form of religious mythologising within which glimpses of historical and geographical truth may just about be gleaned – Brendan the Navigator, an Irish monk, perambulated around the North Atlantic with a small band of followers in search of ‘The Isle Of The Blessed’. He encountered a number of wondrous things, including a pillar of light in the ocean (an iceberg, perhaps), a ‘paradise of birds’ and an island of fire which he believed to be the entrance to hell. It’s likely he had, in fact, chanced upon the isolated volcanic island of Jan Mayan – 400 miles north of Iceland and not subsequently ‘discovered’ by Europeans until 1614. Another possibility is that he witnessed the rise of an undersea volcano that became the isle of Surtsey off Iceland.
Novaya Zemlya - Known from the 11th century, Novaya Zemlya – ‘new land’ – is two giant islands lying between Russia and the North Pole, extending the line of the Ural Mountains northwards. Forced onto land by encroaching ice, Dutch explorer Willem Barents and his crew overwintered on the northern tip in 1596, on a failed voyage to find the North-East Passage between Europe and China. Barents himself died within days of escaping the place the following year. During the Soviet era Novaya Zemlya became a desolated test zone for atomic weapons.
The Last Place On Earth - The Svalbard archipelago, discovered in 1596, lies halfway between Norway’s North Cape and the North Pole. In an iron vault deep underground the world stores the seeds of 1400 varieties of things which grow as insurance against global calamity. Both geographically, and in terms of the survival of humanity, it is the last place on Earth.
Titanium Flag - In August 2007, long after Europeans had ceased careering around the world claiming vast tracts of earth with a flag, the Russian navy planted a titanium flag on the seabed underneath the North Pole. A giant, ridiculous gesture, it lays down the gauntlet for the future mining of natural resources in the Arctic, when the ice has gone. The possibility of commercially viable Arctic oil extraction is the Ultima Thule of the early 21st Century.
Rachelle - We all need a friend sometimes. I’m constantly grateful for mine.
Passing Away - There’s a great deal of sadness and regret in life, some of it avoidable. Making music is a kind of therapy for it. I hope that listening to something made in that spirit can also be a source of uplift or consolation.
Musicians
Colin Harper - Acoustic and Electric Guitars, Keyboards (Track 6)
Cormac O’Kane - Piano, Organ (Tracks 2, 3, 7)
Alan McClure - Lead Violin (Tracks 1, 9)
Molly Stevenson - Second Violin (Track 1)
Una Donnelly - Second Violin (Track 9)
Fintan McMorrow - Viola (Track 9)
Kerry Bryson - Cello (Track 9)
Rachelle Stewart - Clarinet (Tracks 1, 
Linley Hamilton - Flugelhorn (Track 6)
‘Ulster-Scots’ Jim Cuthbertson - Drums, Percussion (Tracks 1, 2, 3, 7)
String arrangement on Track 1 - Belinda Larmour with Alan McClure
String transciption on Track 9 - Anita Mawhinney
‘Novaya Zemlya’ features a didgeridoo / chanting sample from Phil ‘Shiva’ Jones’
‘Meditation Om Chant’, used with permission. www.philjonesmusic.com
Recorded between February – April 2010 at Rhubarb Recordings, Belfast, except
Track 9 which was recorded at Rhubarb Recordings, Belfast, 2006
Engineered by Cormac O’Kane (except Tracks 4 and 5 by Bernard Flanagan)
Produced by Colin Harper
Design & Illustration by www.alexsmee.com
The Ice Museum Suite was inspired by two wonderful books of Arctic history and travel writing: The Ice Museum: In Search Of The Lost Land Of Thule (Viking, 2005)by Joanna Kavenna; and True North: Travels In Arctic Europe (Polygon, 2008) by Gavin Francis.
Thanks to all the musicians who took part but most especially to Cormac for his wizardry of sound, his generosity of pocket and his willingness to find time for me –for this project and for an album’s worth of vocal material which remains in a state of partial completion at the time of writing – amidst many other commitments. Thanks to Avalon Guitars, Newtownards, for such an inspiring instrument: a ‘Millenium Oak’ model, bought in late December 2009 from which has sprung all this music and awholly renewed sense of creativity and possibility. Thanks to Heather for facilitating the purchase of that guitar. Thanks to Phil ’Shiva’ Jones for the use of ‘Meditation Om Chant’. Thanks to Joanna for so enthusiastically allowing the use of her book’s title for the suite of music. Thanks to Alex for what I confidently anticipate at the time of writing will be a fantastic design. And thanks to those friends who have been so encouraging during the period of creating and recording – most especially Carol-Anne Lennie, ‘Uncle Spike’, Brian O’Reilly and Pat Gribben.
This album is dedicated to the master of improvisational and inspirational guitar: Jan Akkerman. ‘Titanium Flag’ was recorded in one take with no rehearsal and no overdubs, while the first of the two guitar parts on ‘To Sail For Eternity’ was recorded in one take with only a basic structure in mind. The confidence and inspiration to try, and hopefully to succeed, in creating music in this way comes entirely from Jan Akkerman. If I’ve come even close to invoking his spirit in those pieces and in the rest of this collection of music I can ask for no more.