Phish’s Page McConnell Shares Surprise Ambient Album ‘Something Will Land’

Phish keyboardist Page McConnell surprised-released a new solo album, Something Will Land, today via his Keyed Records. The record is an ambient journey following his 2021 LP, Maybe We’re The Visitors.

McConnell began working on Something Will Land almost immediately after Maybe We’re The Visitors. While the latter was performed entirely on synthesizers and largely recorded in Reykjavik, Iceland, Something Will Land saw Page retooling his home studio.

“McConnell reconfigured his Burlington, VT studio so that, for the first time, he was able to play, record, and engineer his piano pieces entirely by himself, with no one else in the room,” press materials for the album noted. “McConnell then decided to blend the piano with a panoply of synthesizers after having portioned them in the past. Thus, he let himself be surrounded by electronic and acoustic sounds all at once, fully immersed in the instruments.”

The press release continued:

Each of the eight gorgeous instrumentals McConnell created for Something Will Land feels like a sculptural sanctuary, a hideaway from the hustle of life and the bustle of a band that is constantly busy reinventing itself. McConnell embedded beautiful little melodies amid these long-distance hums, anchors that give these drifts local gravity. “The Trees Were Blue” begins with a series of long, luminescent tones and scrambled signals, but, in the final third of this six-minute wonder, the piano marches triumphantly through the fog, as undaunted by the journey as a stranger’s smile. Elsewhere, “Mystery Meat” feels like an earthbound echo of Brian Eno’s Another Green World, while “Borrowed Scenery” is a piece of perpetual ascendance, McConnell’s rising piano line tugging at the wobbly drones that float beneath it.

Something Will Land arrived with a profile in GQ, where McConnell discussed the album as well as other new music he has in the works.

“It’s hard for me to listen to my own stuff, Phish or any of it, because I want to edit it all,” Page said in the interview. “I hear it and think, ‘I wish I could have played just a few less notes there.’”

The space found throughout Something Will Land reflects that sentiment. Stream the album below:

Page McConnell and Phish are set to return to Madison Square Garden for their traditional New Year’s run. Find Page’s itinerary below.