Fran & Flora’s mixtape for Concrete Islands opens a portal and takes a journey across cultures and musical styles, through the Fourth World and beyond

Fran & Flora’s music is rooted in rich cultural histories and evokes ancient stories, given vivid expression through voice, strings and subtle electronics. With Unfurl they forged something quite unique by interweaving traditional modes and deliveries. Their Seedlings of the Mind mixtape highlights certain connections in their work, offering fresh perspectives and suggesting new conclusions.

Fran & Flora’s liner notes to Seedlings of the Mind may be considered the beginnings of a spoken map, providing a summary of the terrain to be encountered:

We have picked an eclectic mix of tracks that encompass our many influences and also reflect this fresh and exciting time of year – spring – with a particular focus on nature and meditation, both elements fundamental to our lives.

Inspiration for this mixtape stems from the musical explorations of Fourth World pioneers Jon Hassell and Terry Riley in the 1960s to Pandolfi, JS Bach, Hejira, CoCoRosie, Talvin Singh and of course archival Jewish and Roma recordings, which are hard to find so we included a couple here. We hope you can get into these sounds. Our approach to listening: take time to explore the layers in the music and be engulfed by it. And at the end, have a massive dance!!!

Unfurl by Fran & Flora is out now.

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