When I was asked if I would like to get involved with The Outlaw Ocean Music Project, the timing was perfect, as I had just finished recording a new album titled 'Coastal Moods.'  I felt inspired to carry on the ocean theme and soon found myself getting immersed in all the material and stories Ian had compiled. The focus of the project inspired me from day one. It was a welcome opportunity to address a subject that tends to be ignored by mainstream media and to highlight aspects of international lawlessness of which most people are completely unaware.

My back catalog is almost exclusively instrumental in nature, so the chance to use spoken word as an ingredient was, in and of itself, a joy and pushed me into inspiring directions when creating appropriate moods for the music. In addition to the use of dialogue as a sonic ingredient, I also found much of the ambient recordings very useful when developing the musical 'flavors' designed to complement the journalistic focus. A particularly good example of this would be the sound of a heavy machine gun being fired during a confrontation with Somali pirates, which I used as an ingredient in the 'Arms Dealing' track.

Music is often described as a truly universal language, so one of the most exciting aspects of the project was its global reach! Using music as a way of disseminating information across borders and cultural barriers feels like a perfect fit for the content.

Phil Thornton