Censor the Silence

 

Released October 30, 2020
Music and lyrics by Cameron Blake (BMI)
Produced by Cameron Blake

Cameron Blake: vocals, piano (track 5 & 9)
Andrew Saliba: electric & acoustic guitar
Martin Spence: piano, hammond b3 & rhodes
Ian Thompson: electric & upright bass
Andrew Szumowski: drums & percussion
Debra Perry & Majestic Praise: vocals (track 1 & 5)
Patty PerShayla: vocals (track 2)
Jen Fortosis: vocals (track 8 & 2)

Engineered by Ian Gorman (La Luna Recording and Sound) & Drew Elliot (Hope College)
Mixed by Drew Elliot (Hope College)
Mastered by Josh Kaufman (Local Legend Recording, Grand Rapids, MI)
Album Design by Loren Johnson
Album photography by Eric Bouwens

Original Press Release:

Michigan based songwriter Cameron Blake returns with a new gritty, politically charged album Censor the Silence on Friday, October 30. The 10-track LP draws inspiration from a variety of subjects including Greta Thunberg’s speech to the UN, (How Dare You), Parkland gun control activist Emma Gonzalez (Six Minutes Twenty Seconds), the Syrian Civil War (Chemical War Child), the art of Francisco Goya (Only Goya) and the folk tale ‘Chicken Little’ (Henny Penny).

Blake wrote these songs while on a retreat at The Abbey of Gethsemani, a silent Trappist Monastery in Kentucky, best known as the home of writer and activist Thomas Merton. Of the experience, Blake writes, “I was in a dark place and needed to heal, so I went to the most quiet and structured place that I could imagine. The silence was deafening, but I had to face what was going on inside. I woke up with the monks at 3 a.m. for Vigils, sat in the back of the cathedral and, in the words of Hemingway, opened up my journal ‘and bled.’” The result is a collection of songs arranged for a rock combo (electric guitar, piano, bass and drums) with deep grooves, angular guitar riffs and piercing harmonies accompanying Blake’s signature prose.

Censor the Silence is the completion of a trilogy of albums beginning with the solo acoustic Alone on the World Stage (2015) and the heavily orchestrated Fear Not(2017). Both albums garnered international acclaim, made numerous ‘Best of the Year’ lists, and were featured in publications such as Folk Radio UK, The Huffington Post, No Depression, Cashbox Canada and Paste.