Cocteau Twins' Simon Raymonde Shares And Talks About His First New Music In 20 Years

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Simon Raymonde, the former bassist for Cocteau Twins and founder of Bella Union Records, is back after a 20-year hiatus from music with a new song we're premiering. "I Saw The Days Go By" features singer Marissa Nadler and is just one of the tracks from Simon Raymonde's upcoming album he made with drummer Richie Thomas under the name Lost Horizons. The record, Ojalá, is out November 3 on Bella Union.

Lost Horizons YouTube

Cocteau Twins was a seminal band with an ethereal sound that was truly the group's own. The trio released eight albums between 1982 and 1996 and on six of those records, singer Elizabeth Fraser and guitarist Robin Guthrie were joined by bassist and keyboardist Simon Raymonde. In fact it was Simon and Robin who founded the record label Bella Union in 1997 in hopes of putting out their music and their collaborations, but the band fell apart shortly after the label's formation.

For the past two decades Simon Raymonde has kept a watchful eye and ear on the British independent label he started, releasing albums by Australia's Dirty Three, breaking big with the U.S. band Fleet Foxes, Father John Misty, John Grant, Laura Viers, M. Ward, Explosions in the Sky, Xiu Xiu and so many more. It's a wonderful success story that came with a price. For all those years of running a record label, Simon Raymonde stopped doing what he'd loved so much: making music.

All that's changed with the formation of Lost Horizons and their album Ojalá. It's a 15-track labor of love which basically features a different singer on each track. Simon would send a track to someone to sing and, he told me, that "it's like opening a Christmas present everyday. You know, send the track off and my favorite singer would send it back and be like oh my God!"

On this +1 edition of All Songs Considered, Simon Raymonde talks about what finally got him back to making music after so many years. You can hear the full conversation with the play button at the top of the page.