Paul Sebastian - Home Diaries 008 (2020)

Home Diaires 008: Sebastian Paul

Home Diaries is an invitation to artists and musicians to create an album or EP to document their personal experience during the lockdown or social distancing conditions that are upon us, due to the coronavirus outbreak. The series reflects a range of sounds, styles and ideas, as each artist portrays their own reflections uniquely. Each release is digital only for now, as we hope to raise what we can to help keep our label ticking over at this time. The releases feature a recurring polaroid image of a small lonely house, with a coloured filter chosen by the artist for each respective release. We interview each artist and this is included as a bonus PDF with the download. You can also check out the Home Diaries series on Spotify if you prefer, which will be available to stream in due course.

For our eighth contribution to this series, we welcome Cleveland, US based artist Sebastian Paul who has released on labels such as Lagerstätte and Shimmering Moods. The artist is someone who is normally used to staying at home but nevertheless he has been moved by the impact of the pandemic, like many around the world. His contribution to the Home Diaries series is a full album experience, of wide and restful exotic Ambient music.

Each of the ten pieces unfolds slowly and carefully, placing field recordings of the outdoors at its core as calming drones emit into the environment that is created. There is a clear fascination of Japan in Sebastian Paul's work, with previous work nodding in the direction of the far Eastern country. In this Home Diaries edition, he opens with the track 'Tokyo', as one of the most populous cities in the world has its bustling acoustics dampened. Watery, dream-like mirages are woven throughout the album until the final piece 'Paradise' closes this sleepy chapter. The album has been deliberately mastered at a slightly quieter level, to reflect the level of calm that the artist intends for the listener and we find this is best enjoyed with headphones late at night.