Ed O’Brien, photo by Steve Gullick

Every Friday, Relix surveys the wealth of new music released over the past seven days and selects standouts for the Relix Staff Picks playlist. Read on for the highlights from this week’s batch, presented by Qobuz: experience the difference with high-quality music streaming and human-curated selections from the platform that puts artists first.

On Blue Morpho, Ed O’Brien captures a period of personal upheaval and artistic reinvention through uncharted combinations of psychedelic folk and symphonic ambiance. The accomplished singer-songwriter and Radiohead guitarist’s sophomore album took flight from a dark night of the soul and a new artistic dawn in the wake of his 2020 solo debut. Wracked with regret for having waited so long to make his standalone statement and suddenly cast into one of the most challenging periods of his life, the artist found direction in author and environmentalist Wendell Berry’s adage: “To know the dark, go dark.”

O’Brien channeled his scattered thoughts into his guitar for hours at a time at his small London studio, gradually giving rise to an account of transcendence over four years of recordings. He drew inspiration from his connection to the Welsh countryside, the methods of extreme athlete and breathwork instructor Wim Hof, and early songwriting advice from Thom Yorke, who taught him decades ago that the key to craft was cataloging ideas as they arise. He assembled the final product through close collaboration with producer Paul Epworth and sessions with engineer Riley MacIntyre in Wales. Other esteemed contributors include pioneering avant-jazz wind artist Shabaka Hutchings, who contributed flutes after connecting with O’Brien at Glastonbury, and composer Tõnu Kõrvits, who arranged the powerful string portions performed by the Tallinn Chamber Orchestra.

The latest batch of Relix Staff Picks also includes new music from Bill Orcutt & Mabe Fratti, Bleachers, Marisa Anderson, Thomas Sollbaum, Steep Canyon Rangers, The Deslondes, BALTHVS, Mike D, Magic Tubee String Band, Beck Zegans, Colonel Claypool’s Flying Frog Brigade, Hammock, Nora Kelly Band and many more gems. Tune in here.