Black River Bell to Release 'The Great Unknowing' on March 13th

Listen to Single 'The New World' Now

As the songs of native birds fade and the voices of naturalists rise in inverse proportion, it is only to be expected that our artists rise in tandem. It is in this unique moment that songwriter and folk troubadour Black River Bell has returned primed with a timely album rich in melancholy and catharsis, The Great Unknowing. 

After the successful release in 2015 of debut single The Blackbirds, securing support from major broadcasters 4ZZZ, FBi, Valve (UK) and holding #1 on Triple J Unearthed charts, Black River Bell (aka Sydney singer-songwriter Timothy Bray) began writing a collection of new songs which dealt with the anxiety of living in a time of environmental annihilation and existential threats. 

Working with producer Neal Sutherland (Jack Ladder), in early 2016, something larger and more ambitious began to slowly reveal itself and from these sessions came the nine tracks which make up Black River Bell’s long anticipated debut album The Great Unknowing, an expansive and bold new landscape of a darker, stranger and more experimental Black River Bell. 

Lead single The New World achingly illuminates Bray’s and Sutherland’s ability to conjure the atmosphere of a world slowly breaking apart and the subsequent despair. A descent into dystopia, haunted by the echoes of a once beautiful Earth. 

Within The Great Unknowing you’ll be treated to the inventive juxtaposition of traditional and experimental approaches to folk. Story is at the forefront, experiments in texture and ambience are used to deftly expand the theatric atmosphere, heightening the themes and producing a consuming experience that is both adventurous and accessible, strangely familiar but beautifully alien.

Throughout this release period, Timothy Bray is planning on an intimate series of live shows, where the songs arranged so meticulously in the studio, will be given room to breathe and take on new forms. In these spaces The Great Unknowing will provide cathartic support for the voices and the narratives of change.