Experiment to ‘escape isolation of lockdown’ to be part of Freedom Festival

‘TRANSPORT YOU TO ANOTHER REALITY’: Joe Hakim. Picture by Gareth Sleightholme

An artistic collaboration that began as an experiment to escape the isolation of lockdown is now to form part of the digital Freedom Festival.

Music collective The Broken Orchestra has teamed up with writer Joe Hakim to create Extra Life, a four-part science-fiction sonic odyssey, which promises to “transport you to another reality”.

Combining Joe’s distinctive spoken word with The Broken Orchestra’s lush soundscapes, the four-part musical movement is their first collaboration, and began life as a lockdown experiment to “escape isolation and open a doorway to another universe”, they said.

Best experienced wearing headphones, it invites listeners to be “transported to another dimension while on the bus, in the bath, or by simply gazing up at the sky”, and “allow yourself to be carried along by the story and music and make the time to escape into Extra Life”.

Comprising four short bursts of a condensed, grand narrative which can enjoyed as individual songs or collectively as one epic sequence, Extra Life will be serialised over four nights of the festival via the Freedom Festival app. It will be also made available as a complete experience for a week following the festival.

Although it is the first time they have worked together, both parties are well established in their respective fields.

The Broken Orchestra’s collaboration with TinB, Someone Just Pressed Pause, recently featured on Steve Lamacq’s BBC Radio 6 Music show as Tom Robinson’s personal pick for Track of the Year so far.

The Broken Orchestra also provided the soundtrack to the audio version of Vicky Foster’s award-winning play Bathwater. The same partnership also delivered the words and music for last year’s Fair Winds & Following Seas, an audio-guided walk along the River Hull.

Earlier this year, Joe’s debut novel The Community made the longlist for the 2020 British Science Fiction Awards. He also presents Culture Night on BBC Radio Humberside and is a columnist for The Hull Story.

As reported here yesterday, Hull tech company Sauce has developed an app that will allow The Freedom Festival to be accessed digitally all year round. The hugely successful festival, which was launched in 2007, will not go ahead in its traditional format this year after large public gatherings were banned because of the Covid-19 pandemic.