Ocean in a Drop

Manchester trio GoGo Penguin present Ocean in a Drop: Music for Film, a new five-track EP developed from the band’s acclaimed score for Godfrey Reggio’s cult 1982 documentary Koyaanisqatsi, which until now had only been performed live. This expansive project carries a sense of poetry: its title refers to a quote attributed to the 13th-century Sufi scholar and poet Rumi: “You are not a drop in the ocean; you are the entire ocean in a drop.”

Released in 1982, Godfrey Reggio’s documentary Koyaanisqatsi became a cult classic, in part thanks to its celebrated score by Philip Glass. Both the work and its composer had an enormous influence on pianist Chris Illingworth, bassist Nick Blacka, and drummer Rob Turner—so much so that in 2015 the British trio developed their own score for Reggio’s film, which they performed exclusively on stages around the world.

That project became the starting point for Ocean in a Drop: Music for Film, a five-track EP based on the live compositions written for Koyaanisqatsi. Initially, Illingworth had no intention of recording the score:

“People kept asking whether we wanted to release this music as an album, but it didn’t feel right to us. The film already has a great score, but we really enjoyed the project and, in particular, writing music for film, so that became the inspiration for Ocean in a Drop. Performing the score live requires an enormous amount of effort, both physically and mentally, and the recording was no exception. We recorded the tracks together live, as we had done with our previous records, without overdubs or splicing separate parts together.”

The influence of Philip Glass, already an integral part of GoGo Penguin’s DNA, is magnified tenfold here, yet it never overwhelms the improvisation or the lyrical, atmospheric melodies that run through these five stirring tracks.