Big Red - Big Sur *Pre-Order

Big Red is the solo writing vehicle of Joseph Scarisbrick. Originally conceived as a home for songs that sat outside the world of his other project, The Orchestra (For Now), the band has evolved into a three-piece alongside drummer Charlie Hancock and bassist & vocalist Millie Kirby.

Written between London, UK and Santa Cruz, California during the first months of 2025 and recorded live in Devon that April, Big Sur is an album about distance and longing.

At its centre lies an imagined journey to the cliffs of Big Sur. The destination itself becomes increasingly elusive. Across the record, California exists less as a real place than a state of mind — something hoped for, mythologised and, ultimately, unreachable. By the album's closing moments, Scarisbrick arrives at a stark realisation: "We never made it to Big Sur / I guess this kind of looks the same."

Big Sur inhabits a world of deconstructed Americana. Its songs draw on the narrative instincts of country music while rejecting nostalgia and sentimentality. Where Scarisbrick's previous work frequently relied on dense references and literary allusion across The Orchestra (For Now)’s Plan 75 and Plan 76 EPs, Big Sur takes a more direct approach. The writing is confessional; often opening up in brutal honesty.

That sense of exposure extends to the recording itself. Big Sur was captured entirely live by three musicians in a room, with minimal overdubs and virtually no studio embellishment. A second guitar appears occasionally; a cowbell surfaces here and there. Otherwise, what remains is the sound of a band playing together in real time. The end of the record, if you listen closely, is the sound of Charlie and Joe crying after the final take of Lost (and Found).

The result is an album defined by immediacy. There are few places to hide. Every hesitation, every crack in the voice, every moment of tension remains intact.