SHHE releases her new album ‘THALASSA’ on May 15th, a six-part ambient work that gives voice to the Mediterranean Sea at a moment of ecological, political, and existential crisis.
‘THALASSA’ takes its name from the primordial Greek sea goddess, the personification of the sea itself, and unfolds as a sonic dive from submergence to emergence. Journeying through six stages of descent and ascent, the album is built around breath and transformation, drawing on Shaw’s time spent in Alexandria, Egypt, where she was “Musician in Residence” at B’sarya, a project supported by British Council in 2022. Originally commissioned to record the Mediterranean using hydrophones, Shaw found herself unable to capture the sea directly; Alexandria’s heavily militarised coastline prohibited sound recording, above and below the surface. ‘THALASSA’ is an attempt to give voice to a momentous sea that is often rendered silent, or actively silenced.
