Hello, everybody!

Apologies for the lack of updates recently. Life has been chaotic recently, though should be settling down soon. I’m delighted to announce the release of my latest EP, Moments of Safety! It’s currently available to purchase on Bandcamp, and will be up on YouTube and Spotify in the coming days. Here’s the link to buy: https://nicholasowen-petch.bandcamp.com/album/moments-of-safety

This EP is something I’d thought about writing for a while. I love the ‘safe room’ themes from classic Resident Evil games and decided that I wanted to do my own take on them.

Additionally, the idea of safety took on new meaning to me earlier this year – I was living in Kyiv in February when the Russian military started its renewed invasion of Ukraine and I know the terror of waking up at 5am to explosions. Sheltering in an underground car park never felt entirely safe, but it was with trepidation that we ventured outside when the air raid warnings had finished. While two of these tracks were written in Kyiv before the invasion, they developed nuances of emotion that they didn’t have before in the time since.

An interesting aspect of these themes from the old Resident Evil games (and some other survival horror) is that they’re usually quite simple – just a few chords with memorable melodies (and orchestrated beautifully). At the same time, they capture both feelings of comfort and unease – for me, it’s quite incredible how effectively they do this. In my writing, I tend to go quite complex and often have to pull myself back from that. Here was a challenge for me – how could I simplify my writing for each track without making it boring, and how could I write multiple tracks without falling back on the same ideas and chord progressions?

I’m satisfied with the results – each track is quite different from anything I’ve previously written but still sounds like me. In the end, whether this music is effectively written or not is up to each and every person who listens. 

In addition to the new release, today is the anniversary of my first solo album, Let the Journey Begin! The last year has been a very long one and I barely remember frantically trying to release that before moving to Kyiv. I’ve learnt a lot about composition since then and plan to learn even more in the coming year. Thanks for all of the support thus far – I hope you’ll continue to find my music engaging and interesting!