Mostly recorded at home, the album also features contributions from many other musicians including Jon Thorne on bass (Lamb) on harp Tom Moth (Florence and the Machine – and brother of NMA bassist Ceri Monger), plus string arrangements from composer friends Tobias Unterberg, Henning Nügel and Shir-Ran Yinon. Also featured are the current members of New Model Army. The album was mixed by Lee Smith at Greenmount Studios in Leeds, co-producer and mixer of New Model Army’s recent albums, including 2019’s From Here – their highest charting album to date globally.

Justin Sullivan says, “Under the circumstances, it wasn’t particularly surprising that this was the moment to make another solo record and the songs came thick and fast in the first few weeks of the lockdown. There is not so much about ‘what’s happening in the World’. As with ‘Navigating by the Stars’, which was written in the aftermath of 9/11, I wanted to write about other things – some well-known stories, some less well-known, a few autobiographical and more a landscape of the imagination than social comment.

Surrounded will become available on multiple formats such as CD Hardcover Media Book, Heavyweight Double Vinyl Gatefold and Digital and is available for pre-order as of now: Here

Today also sees the release of ‘Amundsen’, the very first single from Surrounded which gives an emotional first insight into this very personal album.

Justin Sullivan about ‘Amundsen’: “The stories of polar (and in particular Antarctic) adventurers at the beginning of the 20th Century have long been a fascination. On my first solo record, ‘Ocean Rising’ is, in part, the story of Ernest Shackleton’s epic voyage from Elephant Island to South Georgia. The final race to reach the South Pole between Robert Scott and Roald Amundsen is another fascinating tale.

“Being raised in England, Scott and his ‘noble, tragic’ failure is a story written large in national mythology but the other man, a truly remarkable explorer, is rarely acknowledged. The battle over who gets to tell which version of a story is very relevant in these times of ‘culture wars’, but the song is more a simple study of the man himself; I hope I have done him justice.”

‘Amundsen’ is now available as stream and digital download: Here

The single is also accompanied by an official music video which can be found on the official New Model Army YouTube channel: Here

Navigating by the Stars will become available digitally and for the first time ever on vinyl. In addition, Justin Sullivan’s stunning debut album comes in a CD Digisleeve Edition with an expanded booklet as part of a Ltd. CD Box-Set Edition of Surrounded, followed by a standalone release later this year.