ALABASTER DEPLUME – To Cy and Lee: Instrumentals Vol 1 (IA11 Edition) – LP – Vinyl [DEC 5]

LP – Black 140-gram vinyl LP inside a heavyweight reverse-board jacket, with a 12-page 11×11″ insert booklet, IARC 2025 obi strip and printed poly-lined printed inner-sleeve. Pressed at Pallas in Germany, with new lacquers cut by Daniel K at SST.

To Cy and Lee: Instrumentals Vol. 1 is a collection of Mancunian poet, singer, saxophonist and composer Alabaster DePlumes simple and serenely intimate wordless adventures in melodic ennui. The collection properly introduced the world to a previously under-exposed, undeniably deep dimension of DePlume who, at the time of the its release, was most known to his (majorly British, majorly committed) followers for his music with words, his poetry, and his prowess as an impassioned orator. His performances (especially those that were part of his monthly Peach residency at Total Refreshment Centre in London) were becoming legendary for blurring the boundaries between secular sermon, theatrical monologue and song, as he turned audiences into experimental large ensembles and lead full-throated shout-a-longs to tunes like Is It Enough and Be Nice To People (both from his 2019 Lost Map album The Corner of a Sphere). The instrumental pieces that quietly buffered the big vocal moments of his recorded catalog, to that point, had mostly lived, quietly, in those buffers.

Were not really sure what inspired DePlume to gather all of his recorded instrumentals, add a couple new ones, and invite International Anthem to collaborate on the campaign (we had only recently been getting to know him a little deeper, after our second trip to Total Refreshment Centre in the fall of 2018 when we recorded jaimie branchs FLY or DIE II: bird dogs of paradise). But what we do know is, not long after To Cy & Lees February 2020 release and the subsequent arrival of a global pandemic, those recordings went very far, very fast, taking on a new life as stay-at-home hits the quiet catharsis we didnt know we needed in the face of rapidly unfolding confusion, fear, and isolation. As the people of the world found themselves inside their small rooms, they began to search for smaller, more intentional sounds to fill them. These instrumentals carried the healing qualities we were after then, and still seek now. As we cite on the obi strip, the music is an antidote with seemingly ancient sonic characteristics, and a unique ability to embrace the core of our very being.

To Cy & Lee was also the first document of an ongoing collaboration between DePlume and International Anthem, which has already yielded the albums GOLD (2022), Come With Fierce Grace (2023), and A Blade Because a Blade Is Whole (2025), in addition to sundry singles and EPs. The depth of partnership between DePlume and our crew that has developed since To Cy & Lee, coupled with the endlessly quenching spiritual comforts the album continues to provide, makes it an absolute essential of the International Anthem catalog and a proud choice for the final three of the IA11 series.

The IA11 Edition of To Cy and Lee: Instrumentals Vol. 1 comes on classic black 140-gram vinyl LP inside a heavyweight reverse-board jacket, with a 12-page 11×11″ insert booklet (including previously-unpublished photos and new liner notes by DePlume himself), IARC 2025 obi strip and printed poly-lined printed inner-sleeve. Pressed at Pallas in Germany, with new lacquers cut by Daniel K at SST.

Tracklist:

A1 Visit Croatia
A2 What’s Missing
A3 Song Of The Foundling
A4 Whisky Story Time
A5 Not Now, Jesus
A6 If You’re Sure You Want To

B1 The Lucky Ones (Feat. Danalogue)
B2 Why, Buzzardman, Why
B3 Not My Ask
B4 Turpentine
B5 I Hope