Brian Silk has released a track about how Covid-19 is in the UK at the moment. Called ‘Darkest Hour (of Covid-19),’ the track combines a musical motif with extracts from news bulletins about the Covid-19 pandemic in the UK over the last roughly 11 months. It is from Brian’s forthcoming album, Bits and Bobs – discarded ideas from his 2020 album, Something for Everyone – but Brian feels Darkest Hour reflects the national mood at this time, so he has decided to make it available now.
Brian said, “I worked on an idea around putting clips from news broadcasts over a mournful-sounding music idea I had had for Something for Everyone.” By yesterday, I had got to a point where the words I had chosen seemed to reflect how things are right now in the UK and contained messages that are relevant to our current situation in early January 2021.
“Rather than make Darkest Hour only available when my album of discarded comes out, maybe a couple of months from now when the feeling may have changed, it felt right to share it as soon as possible. The urgency is why I have put in on Soundcloud immediately – releasing a track on major music platforms, such as Spotify and Apple Music, usually takes a few weeks. It also hasn’t been professionally mixed nor mastered, as that usually takes several days.
“I had to come up with the track title and the artwork this morning. The name hopefully speaks for itself. I took the photo on Erith Pier in April 2020. For me, it reflects an aspect of the overall experience of Covid-19 in the UK but is also right on the pulse of the focus on the NHS now, in early January 2021.
“If there is a rough and rushed feel to various aspects of Darkest Hour, this is because it was rushed.
“This is quite a dark track and I am not looking to upset people, but I feel that Darkest Hour has something important to say in an effective way. So, unusually for me, I do want people to really take in the words I put to my music and especially the ending. The clip of the nurse pleading with the public is as highly relevant today as it was when she featured on the news last spring.”
You can listen to Darkest Hour on Soundcloud: