Lost In Another World, James Ellis Ford’s singular, emotionally resonant second solo album will be released by Domino on August 14th. The first single from the album “Overtones“ is available today, stream here and watch the visualiser below.
Lost In Another World was made from start to finish in just over two weeks in early 2025, while James was on a hospital ward between punishing rounds of chemotherapy, following a diagnosis of acute myeloid leukemia (AML), an aggressive cancer of the white blood cells.
He hadn’t even fully absorbed the implications of the diagnosis – nine months of treatment with only a 30% survival rate – before a bed was found for him at Barts, London. During the second round of treatment, James (known for his production work with Arctic Monkeys, Blur, Depeche Mode, Help(2) for War Child and as both a solo artist and one half of Simian Mobile Disco) did the only thing that felt natural to him; he wrote, played, sang, recorded and mixed a solo album about the experience.
Using a laptop containing his virtual studio and a cheap mic, he created musical sketches. After Sereen, his wife, bought him a fold away IKEA bedside table and some synths to put on it, these sketches swiftly turned into songs. Staff at the hospital got used to taking his blood pressure while he was laying down vocal takes.
“There was no filter. I just sang the first thing that came into my head into the laptop.” It became a form of diary keeping; a way to process what was going on and also a way to cheer himself up, which would account for why some of the album is so surprisingly upbeat and poppy: “It was a pep talk; I was telling myself I was going to be OK. It was one way of dealing with the existential dread I felt. It gave me the ammunition to fight the experience and was a distraction from it.”
Lost In Another World is never self-pitying. If anything, it comes across as a celebration of love. While some of the songs on the album grapple with a clear and present existential fear of death, the calmness of the cancer ward can be credited for the serenity of the album. “They are very, very still, you can end up feeling like you’re on a space voyage.”
But no matter how cosmic or psychedelic the sounds are, the lyrics form a long silvery thread connecting him to a very earthbound and frightening experience: “Now I’m trusting in the process/ But it really fucking hurts/ And I’m not sure this poison/ Isn’t just making it worse”. These songs share the rare unconscious vulnerability of Robert Wyatt or the carefree directness of Paul McCartney, and despite the temptation to do further work on Lost In Another World when he returned home, James essentially left it as it was: “The album is like a photograph. A time capsule.”
Lost In Another World shares the experiences from the frontline of illness; fear, love, reassurance, boredom, pain, calm, disbelief, and ultimately hope. These transmissions from the eye of the storm have informed an album which is truly something special.
James will be performing the following live shows:
Saturday 22nd Aug — Green Man Festival, Wales
Thursday 17th Sept — Horse Hospital, LondonTickets are available for The Horse Hospital here.
