In time for his 40th birthday, Leyland Kirby uploaded a 40-track set — one composition for each year — of short works under the umbrella title We Drink to Forget the Coming Storm. It’s an elegiac collection of nameless songs, each comprised of, as he describes it, “the same elements piano, digital strings and synthesized choir.” The result is a darkly angelic background music, somber tones for somber rooms:
At over three hours in length, the album is such a thing that the musician himself commented on its weightiness, saying in a note that accompanied the release, “[It] should be used sparingly in your own favourite track combinations.”
Kirby was born May 9, 1974, and for the 40 days (and nights) following May 9 the record is available for free. The album is set on bandcamp.com at “name your price,” which includes free, but certainly chip in.