The album itself
Scott Archibald is a bassist and composer in Montréal. Our musical collaboration goes back a few years now, more of that later in the blog post but it has culminated in this album “Sol Caravan”.
“The id project” is Scott’s compositions: jazz rock, ethno and groove music. “Sol Caravan” has a heavy North African influence but is genre defying and I’ve taken great pleasure is playing both drums and percussion on it. The album also features Mouna Eddrou‘s haunting Sufi influenced vocals as well as featuring UK legends Justin Adams, John Baggot and Howie Gill with UK producer Steve Evans.
“Sol Caravan” is available for download on Scott’s Bandcamp page and is well worth it even if I am a bit biased!
How Sol Caravan was recorded
The songs “Taksim Nights, Modern Man, El Fan and Floating”
In April 2025, I joined Scott in Melksham, UK at Steve Evans’ new studio “The Fortress” for the next part of our musical adventure, the recording of a new album.
I tracked drums for the first afternoon for the song “Floating” and for some other tracks that Scott will be releasing later. I was then joined by Justin (Jam Wobble, Sinead O’Connor, Robert Plant), John (Massive Attack, Robert Plant) and Howie, a talented young drummer and producer currently based in London.
The first day was taken up with rehearsals and jams in Steve’s immense live room. The second day, three tracks were recorded live and filmed.
It was a highly successful and fun session to have been on and I believe the quality of the results are a credit to the sound of the live room, Steve’s talent as a sound engineer and recording and the “vibe” created by five experienced musicians having fun in the studio.
The songs “The Blue Door, Le Caravanserais, Road to Mandalay and People of Beauty”
These tracks originally featured on Scott’s first EP “Sentient Machines” which he then re-mixed to go on the Sol Caravan album.
Scott was due to go to my studio in Morocco for a recording project early 2020 but like so many projects at that time, COVID put a dramatic stop to the project.
However, Scott eventually did get to Morocco and spent time in Essaouira studying guembri, soaking in the atmosphere, eating fish and getting lost in the medina. In October 2022, Scott, myself and Mouna finally hooked up in France and the long-awaited recording sessions happened at the “Studios de la Filature” in Périgueux with talented engineer and producer Arthur de Cossette.
The process…
Scott came armed with a mix of or quasi-complete tracks, 2 of which were written using some of my loops (for example the “Funky Rai” loop for the song “The Blue Door”). I then re-recorded the drums and percussion on these tracks and added percussion to the 3rd track “The Road to Mandalay”.
The drums and percussion sessions lasted for 3 days and the final 2 days were taken up adding Mouna Eddrou’s vocals and extra bass and guitar from Scott. Scott then took the Sentient Machines recording to Canada for a final mix and mastering.
In Scott’s own words:
“Sentient Machines” is some of my music and some collaboration between myself and my friend Simon Webster, who is a master percussionist from the UK and his partner Mouna Eddrou, who is a Moroccan Sufi singer. I’m very proud and excited to present this project. It is some of the most interesting and original music I have made so far in my life as a musician. This recording also features my guitar playing and occasional vocal, and of course some fretless low end.
“The Blue Door” is inspired by North African and gnaoua music combined with some bluesy and folk elements. It is about getting lost in the medina in Essaouria , Morocco. All of the doors were painted blue, and I spent quite some time trying to find my door where I was staying, wandering around in what seemed like a maze or a labyrinth trying to find my “blue door.” I came to realize that I had passed by it several times unknowingly.
People Of Beauty (Funky Rai ) was inspired by Simon’s drum and percussion loop called Funky Rai , which brought out some of my funk and latin influences on bass as well as some dirty, fusiony guitar with Simon’s funky drumming and layers of percussion. The title “People of Beauty” is inspired by a translation of Mouna’s vocals, which alludes to the beauty of the human spirit in Sufism.
“Road to Mandalay” is based on some riffs that I wrote years ago on a Turkish mandolin that I bought in a music shop in Istanbul during my travels in 2012. From there I traveled to the Cappadocia region of Turkey and came up with the original riff while jamming on the mandolin inside an ancient chapel carved into the rock. My journey carried on from Turkey to the mountains of Myanmar , where I ended up taking a journey on an old train that had one of the highest elevations in the world followed by one of the hairiest bus rides I’ve ever had back down to the northern city of Mandalay. This tune was finally brought to life and realized by Simon’s layers of percussion and Mouna’s ethereal vocals, resulting in a fusion of Arabic, African and Pan- Asian influences.
A Canada, UK, Morocco, and France joint effort. Last but not least , this was made possible in part by the excellent engineering of Arthur DeCosette at Sans Reserve Studios, Perigueux, France.”
So what’s next for Sol Caravan and the id project?
Scott’s plan is to put together a band to gig the project which would be fantastic and would definitely work really well on the festival circuits. Who know’s, it could be in Canada, France, the UK and even Morocco!
To follow the project go to either Scott’s website where he will be posting regular updates and eventual gig dates or here on my website.
He will also be releasing videos of the live Fortress sessions and if you go to his Instagram and Facebook pages you will already find reels and extracts.
Congratulations Scott on a great project!