Spirits Flying Home is the latest album from Melbourne composer and guitarist, Cam Butler. The album is marked by deep, solo electric guitar distortion, intricate looping and reverbs and is Cam's most personal album to date.
"When I was recording Spirits Flying Home, I wanted to create an album that was a total guitar experience. As a solo player, I can be more dynamic and more expressive; the memories of some dearly departed friends and close musical collaborators were close at hand when I was working on this record, something in my subconscious that was part of the albums creation. I wanted Spirits Flying Home to have a very personal feeling, as well as trying to have a sense of universal human themes of death and loss, the immensity of it all, of life."
"It is a beautiful elegiac album, sparse and open, consisting entirely of sparkling guitars interspersed with ambient movements borne on a shimmering drone. Butler’s use of subtle delay, reverb and chorus on his guitar creates a bejeweled sonic landscape that is dreamy and spacious. The titles of the songs reveal the strong connection these pieces have to the earth and skies: tracks either dense and layered or spacious and open." Backseatmafia.com
Cam's Bandcamp page
Strings Music, from 2023, is available on cd and digitally from Cam's Bandcamp site and also Apple Music etc.
"Strings Music is a retrospective album for which I have selected eight of my most compelling compositions. These compositions have been taken from previous albums of mine, released between 2003 and 2012, and have been given a new life, with re-recordings, revised arrangements and re-mastering. I have composed one new piece, 'All Our Lives', especially for this album. All the tracks on Strings Music reflect the distinctive compositional and recording approach that I have been working on for many years; combining modern, classical string sections with expressive, reverb-laden electric guitar. The result is a harmonically rich blend of sound that is exciting and emotionally captivating. Strings Music can been seen as an introduction to my music as an Australian composer, and also as a collection of works that are a comprehensive representation of myself as an artist and musican."
Cam Butler is a Melbourne composer, guitarist and producer who has been a long-time creative force on the Australian live and recording scene. He has released ten solo instrumental albums which vary in style from guitar and synthetic soundscapes, to works with string ensembles both large and small. His orchestral compositional approach combines electric guitar with modern classical string sections to create a warm, atmospheric sound that ranges from thrilling drama to wistful sadness. Butler's unique musical vision is evocative, often being described as 'cinematic'. Greatly inspired by the environs and landscapes of Southern Australia, Butler views himself as an artist working from an Australian perspective, creating his own, singular version of contemporary, classical music.
'The results are euphoric, music that is cinematic and richly emotional.' Courier Mail
Cam's Bandcamp page
"Solar takes us on a magnificent sonic journey, from sweeping vistas to thunder and rain, from crystalline guitars to string arrangements that are weeping and melancholy one minute and that thunder and rage the next."
Arun Kendall, backseatmafia.com
"Genres blend and collapse on Solar with seeming ease, Butler in one part tearing through a track as part of the guitar trio and in another roaring alongside the string orchestra. If the music exudes power and dynamism, that's to be expected from a project whose title carries it with associations with the sun, energy, and solar power."
Ron Schepper, textura.org
"Majestic and beautifully constructed soundscapes."
Australian Musician Magazine
Order 'Solar' via Cam's Bandcamp page:
'Solar is built around one main musical theme that re-occurs throughout the record. This theme is developed and presented in various musical settings across the album's eight tracks. These tracks range in sound from lush, synthetic soundscapes to live pieces featuring a string quartet and also a fourteen-piece string orchestra, combined with electric guitar, bass and percussion. I aimed for all the pieces on Solar to be exciting and enthralling in equal measure.'
Find Your Love - Cam's album from 2017
Find You Love is the new album from Cam Butler. Comprising a mini orchestra including a fourteen-piece string section, guitars, keyboards, drums and bass, Find Your Love is full of lush textures and sweeping melodies. Find Your Love is Cam's most exciting work to date, with a sound unlike anything else.
"In making Find Your Love, I wanted to create an album which has a thrilling and exciting ensemble sound. I did this by composing for, and recording, a fourteen-piece string orchestra with a live backing band. My unique electric guitar sound is a major feature of Find Your Love too, helping to create an emotive and personal world.
I have been working for many years on a dream of a sound that combines strings, guitars and rock'n'roll rhythm sections. I think that Find Your Love is the most successful realisation of this sound and is my small way of bringing some music into the world that is alive, rich and full of feeling."
Find Your Love digital booklet pdf is here to download
Find Your Love is also now
Self Portrait :: out now ::
Cam Butler (Cam Butler & The Shadows Of Love, The
Coralinas, Ron S. Peno & The Superstitions, Silver Ray) is a unique electric guitarist and composer with an instantly recognisable sound. Rather than relying on fx, Cam uses plectrums, his fingers, found objects, brushes, capos and tunings to fashion his soulful, 21st century guitar music. A lover of the sound of strings, he has composed epic music for string quartets, string orchestras, singers and bands.
His new album, Self Portrait, is a collection of solo electric guitar instrumentals floating on a cushion of mysterious, other-worldly electro-acoustic backings.
Here's Self Portrait on Bandcamp:
Other recordings include 2012's Save My Soul, which features a 23 piece string orchestra. All of Cam's music can be listened to and purchased on his Bandcamp page.
Save My Soul ::
To listen and download a high resolution version (or mp3's) of Save My Soul, please click below to go to the Cam Butler Bandcamp page.
Save My Soul (2012) - here's a video by Jake Simkin of the title track to Save My Soul. From a suite of 5 videos especially created for the whole album.
To hear Cam's work with Ron S. Peno and The Superstitions, please click here
