Zig Zag

Pantomime

1114

A raw and unflinching meditation on isolation and reckoning, At The Prow Of The Lifeboat is the first glimpse into flakebelly’s forthcoming album, The Boy In The Diving Bell. Stripped-down yet searing, the track drifts between hushed, palm-muted acoustic guitar and an aching string quartet, all anchored by flakebelly’s intimate, unvarnished vocal delivery.

A reflection on a lifetime of social missteps and unseen struggles, At The Prow Of The Lifeboat channels the weight of unfinished business into something both deeply personal and quietly vengeful. It’s a reckoning, a release, and a question left hanging in the air - what happens when you come calling for the ghosts of your past?

The album as a whole grows from the alt-folk roots of At The Prow Of The Lifeboat to more experimental, psych-folk territories, blending raw acoustic textures with surreal, otherworldly soundscapes. With its lo-fi aesthetic, first-take performances, and the imperfections of an ancient analog Akai tape machine, The Boy In The Diving Bell embraces its rawness, mistakes left in, and a uniquely unpolished atmosphere. For those drawn to the stark honesty of Elliott Smith or the simmering intensity of early Nick Cave, At The Prow Of The Lifeboat offers a haunting introduction to the diverse and immersive sonic world of The Boy In The Diving Bell.


At The Prow of The Lifeboat

Buy on Bandcamp

A collection of Haiku to ambient music with electronic drums

Operator Operator

"EZ Top"

Darcy lit a Newport with a gas station match
Leanin' on Joey’s Civic, the paint all scratched
With a trunk full of tools and 8-track dreams
She said, “They say Bushwick’s changing, but it’s still the same to me”

Joey had a scar from the Navy days
Said he used to fix turbines out in San Diego Bay
Now he’s doin’ drywall for a friend in the Heights
Said, “Baby, we’ll be alright, just gotta make it through another night”

In the empty lot behind Ed’s Food Store
With a streetlight buzzin’ like a holy war
They shared a cola and a cigarette
Talkin’ 'bout the days they haven’t lived yet
Skyline rising in the rearview light
Lookin’ for a way out on a one-way night

She had a spiral notebook full of names
Some ol’ boyfriends and schemes that never came
But Joey only read the poems she wrote in bed
About motels by the ocean and the words she never said

At her cousin’s place off Dekalb Avenue
Took turns in the shower, shared the one good bath towel
She worked part-time at the thrift on Flushing
Stole snacks for Joey when the hunger came rushing

In the empty lot behind Ed’s Food Store
With a streetlight buzzin’ like a holy war
They shared a cola and a cigarette
Talkin’ 'bout the days they haven’t lived yet
Skyline rising in the rearview light
Lookin’ for a way out on a one-way night

Some nights they’d dance to the car stereo
Some nights they’d fight about nothin' at all
She’d cry in the front seat, he’d punch the dashboard
But they never stopped showing up when the other one called

That winter hit hard and the heat got cut
But they wrapped up in blankets and called it enough
She said, “This ain’t pretty, but it’s better than gone”
He said, “Darcy, you and me, we’ve been holdin’ on this long”

In the empty lot behind Ed’s Food Store
With a streetlight buzzin’ like a holy war
They shared a cola and a cigarette
Talkin’ 'bout the days they haven’t lived yet
Skyline rising in the rearview light
Lookin’ for a way out on a one-way night

Brooklyn Love Song (with Joliz)

New Economy

Good Afternoon Captain

made the casio keyboard piano sound and multitrack
zoom h1 mic
nch edit
Photo by Saranjeet Singh on Unsplash
TRACK NUMBER 601

sad piano noodles using my favorite 7 notes D E♭ G♭ G A B♭ D♭ (corrected!)

The tires roll soft on a road unnamed 
A hymn drifts out from a far-off band 
We whisper the words like a secret prayer 
And we follow the night with an open hand 

And we lean into the silence
When the static casts a spell 
We search all the channels 
When the station says farewell
Somewhere by the Nowhere Motel

The lights go red in the rearview glass
A gas pump lit up like a chapel sign
We pass it by like dreams we’ve had
Still whispering into the night

And we lean into the silence 
When the static casts a spell 
We search all the channels 
When the station says farewell
Somewhere by the Nowhere Motel

A voice on the dial says the war is done
But she keeps her coat wrapped so tight
We drive through towns forget their names
As they slowly fade out of sight

And we lean into the silence
When the static casts a spell 
We search all the channels 
When the station says farewell
Somewhere by the Nowhere Motel
Somewhere by the Nowhere Motel

Nowhere Motel (with Joliz)

Popfuture is the work of Edmund Ward, an electronic musician based in North London. He has been writing music since the mid-nineties and saw some success back in the day with a band called Eggboy in which he collaborated with his brother John Jo Ward. Edmund originally comes from Malvern in Worcestershire and draws inspiration from his fairly unusual upbringing, living in the middle of nowhere, in a terrifying Victorian house and the youngest of a family of 11 children (all by the same Catholic parents). As luck would have it, Ed's taste in music is also catholic (small c). Drawing on transcendent melodies from Thomas Tallis to Brian Eno, the fine quantised beats of Kraftwerk, the complexity and humour of Aphex Twin, the sneer of Lou Reed, the mystique of Pink Floyd (prior to Gilmour's appalling last three albums) and the hugeness of Justice (French duo). Ed is pretty much switched on by any genre of well crafted music, art, comedy or film.