Matthew Herbert and Karl Hyde Collaborate on ‘Fatherland’ Album

Karl Hyde (Underworld) and Matthew Herbert are collaborating on an album taken from extracts of the stage show Fatherland.

The play, conceived and written by playwright Simon Stephens and Scott Graham, in collaboration with Hyde, will be premiering at Manchester International Festival this July.

Described as “a bold, ambitious show about the complexities and contradictions of fatherhood” it is the result of a road trip undertaken by the trio in 2015. Gathering stories of fathers and fatherhood from family, friends, and strangers, the result was “a vivid, urgent and deeply personal portrait of 21st-century England at the crossroads of past, present and future.”

The album, Fatherland (Original Music from the Stage Show) features versions of pieces that will be interpreted by the cast of Fatherland with lyrics taken from the original source material captured on the road trip.

“It’s been rewarding collaborating with Karl and the team on a version of a musical that can accommodate these sounds that manage to sound both familiar and alien at the same time. The cherry on the cake was being able to form that new language with Karl, whose impeccable experience shaping words and melody meant that we rapidly found a rhythm that hopefully enabled us to get out the way quite quickly, allowing the audience to listen to the stories themselves.” said Herbert

Watch the trailer for Fatherland below: