Curtis Harding – Departures & Arrivals: Adventures of Captain Curt
Michigan-native neo-soul artist Curtis Harding has seemingly looked beyond the Earth’s atmosphere for inspiration for his fourth studio album, Departures & Arrivals: Adventures of Captain Curt. Envisioned as a concept album about a pilot (the eponymous Captain Curt) who is lost in space, Harding claims that the self-produced album was borne from feeling adrift and disconnected whilst he was away from home, and his desire to discover how to turn those feelings into something positive. Harding’s celestial context is immediately apparent within the atmospheric introduction of the first track on the album, There She Goes. Paying homage to the astral theme, this track is filled with peaks and dips, as Harding’s rich voice, the accompanying harmonic vocals and the warm strings interchangeably build and fade throughout. The utilisation of strings in particular – also present in Hard As Stone and I’m With You – is effective in supporting the concept of the album. With arrangements supplied by composer and conductor Steve Hackman, the symphonic sound of the layered strings naturally constructs an ethereal soundscape.
The repetitive and rhythmic drum beats in the aptly entitled Time, the joyous piano riffs in True Love Can’t Be Blind and the lustrously smooth bassline in The Power spotlight the contributions of the instruments accompanying the vocals on the album. Whilst an otherworldly backdrop may have created a foundation of inspiration for Harding, the sentiment of many of the tracks on the record, such as Out In the Black and The Winter Soldier, are grounded in reality and emphasise the importance of embracing the complexities of life. This is most especially present in the disco anthem The Power, where the hopeful and uplifting lyrics issue a reminder to not hold onto negativity.
There is the feeling that the album could’ve benefited from more consistently leaning into its celestial setting, with every track more thematically unified, as in albums such as David Bowie’s The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars or Daft Punk’s Discovery. Nonetheless, Departures & Arrivals excels due to its personal intimations. Having been raised on gospel, Motown and hip-hop, it is only natural that Harding finds comfort in drawing on those musical influences in the production of his own music. With his latest album, Harding invites the audience to see how integral music is to him, that it is not only a career path, but also a mechanism through which his feelings and experiences are comprehended.
Sunny Morgan
Image: Matt Correia
Departures & Arrivals: Adventures of Captain Curt is released on 5th September 2025. For further information or to order the album, visit Curtis Harding’s website here.
Watch the video for There She Goes here:
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