Felix Mackenzie-Barrow, best known as the co-vocalist and guitarist for alt-country breakout stars Divorce, has shared “The Quiet Was A Heron,” the latest glimpse into his upcoming solo project, Book of Churches. Arriving March 6 via Gravity/Capitol Records, the self-titled debut marks a departure from his band’s collaborative sound, favouring a “DIY and naive” approach that emphasises raw, singular vulnerability.
Written and recorded in isolated bursts while touring with Divorce, the album was born from a self-imposed rule: each track was written in a single day and recorded the next. The result is a collection of “candid and profoundly raw” songs that lean into the timeless minimalism of folk icons like Nick Drake and Leonard Cohen. Mackenzie-Barrow describes the project as a personal “North Star,” charting the emotional wreckage of lost love, grief, and anger through a process he calls “the raw contents of my brain.”
The new single, “The Quiet Was A Heron,” centres on a fleeting moment of perspective at a music festival in the Brecon Beacons. Speaking on the track’s origins, Mackenzie-Barrow explains:
“I watched a heron fly at dusk above the noise and chaos… It led me back to a memory of the family dog digging up the bones of a heron buried many years before in my parents’ garden. It is an angry song—angry that we as a species render so many gentle, beautiful, irreplaceable lives so unliveable.”
