Cosmograf announce 6th album The Hay-Man Dreams

Cosmograf

Cosmograf have announced that their sixth album will be released this summer.

Titled The Hay-Man Dreams, it will launch on July 10 and is said to be “a collection of six songs presenting a mythical tale of a farm labourer that dies prematurely leaving a loving wife and young family.

“His widow builds a scarecrow effigy as a shrine to her loss, and this ‘Hay-Man’ spends his weather beaten days in eternity, dreaming beyond his field.”

Cosmograf’s Robin Armstrong says: “It’s really a dark love story about a relationship built during a life of hard labour working on a farm in rural Britain.

“I came up with the idea after researching the fate of my great great grandfather who was a farm labourer and gamekeeper and died in mysterious circumstances.

“I’m making no apologies for the retrospective feel this record has. My previous album was very cinematic and sci-fi in presentation and I consciously wanted this record to sound very different – much warmer and evocative of albums of the 70s. I think this suits the folk tale feel of the album. ”

The Hay-Man Dreams will feature guest performances from Rachael Hawnt, Kyle Fenton, Matt Stevens, Rachel Hall and former BBC voiceover artist David Allan.

A full tracklist will be revealed in due course, while the cover art can be seen below.

Cosmograf's Robin Armstrong on concept albums and staying independent

Scott Munro
Louder e-commerce editor

Scott has spent more than 30 years in newspapers, magazines and online as an editor, production editor, sub-editor, designer, writer and reviewer. Scott joined our news desk in the summer of 2014 before moving to the e-commerce team in 2020. Scott maintains Louder’s buyer’s guides, scouts out the best deals for music fans and reviews headphones, speakers, books and more. He's written more than 11,000 articles across Louder, Classic Rock, Metal Hammer and Prog and has previous written for publications including IGN, the Sunday Mirror, Daily Record and The Herald, covering everything from daily news and weekly features, to video games, travel and whisky. Scott's favourite bands are Fields Of The Nephilim, The Cure, New Model Army, All About Eve, The Mission, Cocteau Twins, Drab Majesty, Marillion and Rush.