{"product_id":"cate-le-bon_pompeii_2025_disco-virgin-music-group","title":"Pompeii","description":"Pompeii, the sixth studio album by Cate Le Bon and the successor to the 2019 Mercury Prize-nominated album Reward, bears a title loaded with history that evokes the apocalypse. The sound is minimal in places and the lyrics oscillate between introspection and direct address. Cate wrote the album primarily on bass and composed it entirely alone in an uninterrupted void. She plays all the instruments (except drums and saxophones) and recorded the album largely alone with her long-time collaborator and co-producer Samur Khouja in Cardiff, Wales. The main objective of this project was to mimic the religious sensibility of one of Tim Presley's paintings, hung on the wall of the Cardiff studio like a meditative image, and which was reproduced with Cate's image to illustrate the cover of Pompeii. Here she is with her fist on her heart, robust and saintly. Cate wondered how to make music that sounds like a painting. That's when the characteristic synth sounds of Pompeii come into play, from cherished instruments such as the Yamaha DX7; bass lines inspired by 1980s Japanese city pop and designed to bring joy and abandon; vocal arrangements that add memorable depth to the melodic fabric of each song; jazzy percussion from Stella Mozgawa sent from locked-down Australia. The songs of Pompeii seem suspended in time, both current and instantaneous, but reactionary and Dada-esque in their insistence on being playful, satirical, and surreal. From the fiery bass of \"Moderation\" to the flashy saxophone of \"Running Away,\" an exquisite story by nature but ultimately doomed to fail, escape as a foil to the outside world. With Pompeii, Cate Le Bon's bold tribute to memory, compassion, and the inevitability of death endures.","brand":"Cate Le Bon","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":57520714940760,"sku":null,"price":23948565.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"url":"https:\/\/vinyles.com\/en-us\/products\/cate-le-bon_pompeii_2025_disco-virgin-music-group","provider":"Vinyles.com","version":"1.0","type":"link"}