David Sylvian is a man apart. In a thirty-year career that spans the New Romantic movement, ambient works, progressive rock, and mature esoteric pop, Sylvian has tested popular styles and bent them to his own vision. But the '00s have seen a more extreme side of his work. While 2003's Blemish startled long-time fans with its emotional rigour, Sylvian has taken the next step with Manafon (his first solo album in 6 years) - a work of nuance and stern musicality, that is also intriguing, suspenseful, and horribly beautiful. On Manafon, Sylvian pursues "a completely modern kind of chamber music. Intimate, dynamic, emotive, democratic, economical." In sessions in London, Vienna, and Tokyo, Sylvian assembled the world's leading innovative artists, exploring improvisation, space-specific performance, and live electronics. From Evan Parker and Keith Rowe, to Fennesz and members of Polwechsel, to Sachiko M and Otomo Yoshihide, they provide both a backdrop and counterweight his own vocal performances - which, minus one instrumental, are nakedly the center of each piece. Manafon has a forbidding core, but just as a cello might visit like a warm hand on a forehead, aesthetically, each piece contains an engrossing discovery. Presented in the usual hi-quality digipak featuring exquisite artwork from Ruud Van Empel and designed by Chris Bigg.

Track Listing

Disc 1:

1. Small Metal gods
2. The Rabbit Skinner
3. Random Acts Of Senseless Violence
4. The Greatest Living Englishman
5. 125 Spheres
6. Snow White In Appalachia
7. Emily Dickenson
8. The Dept Of Dead Letters
9. Manafon