IF IT’S OUT THERE, IT’S IN HERE
TILLISON GOES SOLO ON NEW TANGENT LP
UK prog mainstays The Tangent have announced their 13th studio album, To Follow Polaris – and singer-keyboard player Andy Tillison reveals that it’s a solo record in the truest sense.
“It’s what Elon Musk would refer to as ‘absolutist’,” says Tillison of his decision to handle all the instruments on the record himself.
“Every Tangent album has had this sliding doors moment, where I could go off and finish it myself or I could bring in the other guys. This time, I wondered if I could take it the whole way. Plus it just happened that some of the others weren’t available this time.”
As with every Tangent album, To Follow Polaris – out via InsideOutMusic on May 10 – was recorded in Tillison’s home studio.
“I gave myself the chance to play things that I never would have before,” he says. “I’ve been playing the drums for years, but I’ve never got a chance to play them on a Tangent album. And I got my first bass at Christmas 2022 –
I’d never needed one before because I’m in a band with Jonas Reingold, so it would be ridiculous. But I think the bass on this record sounds pretty damn good.
Though rest assured, the bassist fell out with the drummer!”
Tillison describes To Follow Polaris as ultimately an “optimistic” record. Indeed, opening track The North Sky ties in lyrically with the album’s title.
“For me, it’s all about truth,” he says. “Everybody‘s arguing about everything: did we land on the Moon? Is the Earth flat? Did he say that? Did she do this? It’s crazy. I wanted to find one thing that nobody can argue about, because it’s always there in the north, all the other stars go round it. Even the flat-Earth people can’t deny Polaris.”
The album’s five tracks range from the blackly humorous The Fine Line (“There’s a Venn Diagram with one circle that says ‘The Apocalypse’ and the other that says ‘Having To Go To Work’ and the area in the middle is where we’ve ended up”) to A Like In The Darkness, which finds Tillison questioning the value and worth of art in a world where success is measured in online clicks.
“Time after time, I’ve been sat here late at night, writing the songs and putting them together, with a light burning that nobody else can see,” he says. “There always comes this point where you think, what am I doing this for? People are fighting wars, and all I have to offer is this pathetic little tune. How many lives is that going to save? How beneficial is that going to be?’ All artists ask themselves that question.”
To Follow Polaris’s longest track, the 21-minute The
