Making An Album In Lockdown
Photo by Charlotte Jopling featuring Rayworth, Romick B Dube and ZAR!
2020 has been a madness eh?
After all our success in 2019 with the first Circle of Light album project, we just couldn’t let 2020 be a write off! So in the midst of the chaos we decided to go ahead with our second COL album project. By this point, we’d all had enough of Zoom so we invited other young people to come, in person, to get creative with us.
This year's project not only came with new talent from around the midlands but also new ways of connecting and collaborating following the UK lockdown.
Before we could get started we had to make the space as COVID safe as possible. We bought sanitisers, plastic dividers, gloves and even made branded COL masks. We spent weeks figuring out systems that would minimise contact but still make it possible for us to share ideas and make some awesome music
All the preparation and safety procedures made us nervous to kick off the project. We weren’t sure whether anyone would feel comfortable being in a room with other people after the frighteningly rapid spread of COVID19.
However, after months of being without friends or family and every human interaction having moved online, it wasn’t scary to be a bit closer to other people - it was a relief.
Many of us had been struggling with creative blocks and the pressure to create something when you have nowhere else to be. We found that stress and mental health problems were emphasised by the lack of human connection.
Being able to finally get out and do something meant we all grabbed this opportunity by the horns and gave it everything we had. The album was an absolute banger! We made so many great songs that we had to split it into 2 releases and in true COL style, we ended the 3 weeks with an incredible COVID safe livestream gig.
The second Circle of Light album project provided a much needed burst of hope and excitement for a group of creative young people living through this life changing pandemic. The experience brought together some fabulous familiar faces and some ridiculously talented strangers to form a bigger, stronger creative network that couldn’t be stopped by a pandemic.
As always, we want to thank Youth Music for making this possible! You can check out their interview with some of our artists here:
Photo by Charlotte Jopling featuring Emily Makis and Bethany Dyson
Photo by Charlotte Jopling featuring Tom Hodson