It almost seems criminal to listen to Gaia (An Ecological Meditation) by Belfast’s own David “Hopi” Hopkins through headphones or inside (through speakers). Created, initially, as an exercise to create spontaneous, organically-generated music using as “lo-tech” instruments as possible, morphed into David tapping into more of that primordial power found within ancient tools. Drone tubes, rainmakers, zampoñas, and bodhran, are some of the few of the many cross-cultural instruments spanning all sorts of indigenous societies, heard in the music of Gaia.
Rather than impart them with any specific tempo or melodic stricture, or denigrate these instruments as “uncivilized” David tries to draw them closer to their environmental origin, where their true power stems from, landing on a masterpiece of unpretentious environmental music that is both a joy to hear but also wonderfully meditative. If one must truly hear Gaia, one can best do so hearing it en plein aire, where the sounds of your world mix in with the otherworldly, worldly sounds of his, as found then.
As I’m writing this review, playing his album out, I hear birds chirping outside my window, enjoying, imbibing with David’s atmosphere. I also feel the sun coming through the shades of my window. I feel torn, wanting to be outside but staying here, (at least for a moment) getting some kind of divine inspiration from music speaking of what awaits me out there. Who knows? Maybe those tougher critics know something more that I have yet to discover. But enough of my yapping, I’ll let David take it from here…
Using “left brain” (analytic) faculties to describe what is essentially “right brain” (intuitive) in nature is something of a paradox and I would prefer to let Gaia tell her own story, but for those who like to read sleeve notes while, or before, listening to an album I will try my best!
The name “Gaia”, the Earth goddess of the ancient Greeks, has been restored to contemporary use by those in our own civilisation who perceive, as certain less “civilised” societies have always done, that the Earth is a living, breathing, intelligent entity, not an inanimate “cornucopia” to be ruthlessly and relentlessly exploited. It is not for me, here, to write about the ills of the world – the evidence of pollution, both mental and environmental, is all too obvious – but if this album has a function beyond that of entertainment, let it be as a kind of “Ecological Meditation”. By this term I mean a real meditation (not some vague, pseudo-spiritual mind-massage) toward a greater “personal” ecology, which is surely where the task of restoring the balance on a global scale must begin.
Gaia is of Elements and Elementals; of Man and his inter-relationship with Nature (and so-called Supernature). In this album, called after her; I have tried, using the voices of “primitive” instruments, uncluttered by technique, to invoke/evoke these principles. Whatever, the result I would ask is that the music to be not ‘consumed” by the senses nor “analysed” by the intellect. Rather let it be absorbed into the fabric of your own “Gaia-consciousness’:
The album itself, in keeping with the whole concept, evolved fairly “organically” and I could honestly say “magically” at the time of recording. As it slowly took form I became increasingly aware that, far from being the artist/composer at the centre of the entire process, I was but a catalyst in a reaction. Perhaps it was in the interaction between “lo-tech” instruments and “hi-tech” sound equipment. Perhaps it was more…
Anyway, it was only after the recording was completed that I began to notice the balance that existed, outside my own contrivance, within and between the four individual pieces (certain qualities and dualities such as Invocative-Evocative; Active-Passive; Light-Dark; Open-Enclosed Space; “Masculine”-“Feminine”; Motive-Restive; Hot & Wet – Cool & Dry – Hot & Dry – Cool & Wet; etc.). With this unplanned inter-relatedness I really began to wonder if, just as Gaia is ultimately, in control of her own destiny, this album hasn’t had a hand in its own making! That may be pure fancy of course…
-On Gaia by David Hopkins from liner notes to album.
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“This we know: The Earth does not belong to Man; Man belongs to the Earth. All things are connected like the blood which unites one family. Whatever befalls the Earth will befall the sons of the Earth. Man did not weave the web of life, he is merely a strand in it. Whatever he does to the web he does to himself.
— Chief Seattle, 1852, as his people gave up their ancestral lands to white settlers.