Today marks the release of ffolliott’s Gree, a debut album full of life and texture, released via our sister label Kitto Records. Kitto has long been part of the wider CDR family, so we’re especially happy to see this out in the world. The Belfast artist behind ffolliott has been a friend of Kitto founder Joe Doyle for more than a decade, making Gree a release with a particularly personal connection.

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Pronounced faw-lee-ott, ffolliott first appeared on record with ‘IDKWHY’, released quietly as part of Rhythm Section’s Shouts 2021 compilation. The track went on to garner millions of streams and support from tastemakers across KCRW, NTS and BBC Radio. Since then, he’s been patiently building the world of Gree.

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“Life was to-ing and fro-ing around me at that time, and the big long staircase of making an album felt like a comforting bottomless pit I could crawl into and escape.”

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Gree feels like a journey as much as it does a physical space. The album is emotive and nostalgic, moving through memories of childhood, family life and addiction, and moments spanning from the 90s to the present day. Rather than following a single narrative, it shifts between different periods and perspectives, with a particular focus on what happens behind closed doors: the things heard through walls, left unsaid or overheard.

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The project came together through a near-daily writing process which began in 2020, with ffolliott establishing an intricate world coloured by nostalgia, family archive recordings, DIY soundscapes and the vinyl crackle of analogue samples. Vocals and guitars were recorded through a single microphone, drums built from record samples and sequenced on an old MPC, with much of the sound coming from ageing analogue gear collected over time.

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The result is a debut project that feels like an antidote to the rise of AI music and the overly polished sound of today. Gree leaves the hiss, crackle and instability of life intact.

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The world of Gree is further developed through the extensive artwork archive of ffolliott’s late father, a prolific self-taught artist and microbiologist whose work has never been shared publicly before. The front cover features an etching from The Dream Machine, a series of 32 black-and-white works created in 1980s Northern Ireland, while the back cover brings together unfinished doodles, sketches and drawings recovered from his notebooks and diaries, some dating back to his childhood.

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“A big part of the ffolliott project has always been to get my dad’s artwork seen alongside my music. I’d always admired it – it felt like something that shouldn’t just live in the house.”

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The family archive is threaded through the music too, including childhood cassette recordings of ffolliott and his sister staging their own improvised radio shows on a boombox in the 90s.

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Stream the album now everywhere, or support the release on Bandcamp where you can purchase a vinyl or a postcard featuring artwork from The Dream Machine archive.