Robin Katz Shares Full Album ‘Hypnos’
London-based guitarist and composer Robin Katz is sharing his new album ‘Hypnos’, out May 29, 2026 via Gearbox Records.
Rooted in jazz, the album brings together nylon-string guitar, quiet atmosphere and Hammond organ, played by Nathaniel Ledwidge. The record is spare and intimate, but not plain. Katz lets flamenco, bossa nova, minimalism, soul, funk and jazz sit quietly underneath the music rather than pushing them to the front.
‘Hypnos’ follows Katz’s debut EP ‘Oceans for Eros’, made with orchestrator Guy Barker, and last year’s Rock Music, produced by FREEMONK. The new album was produced by Katz and FREEMONK, recorded and mixed by FREEMONK at The Friary Studios, and mastered by Caspar Sutton-Jones at Gearbox Productions.
Speaking about the record, Katz says:
“My early childhood was spent in southern Spain and I remember seeing flamenco in the local villages and my mother playing Paco de Lucia records on the drive to school. Back in the UK as a teenager I picked up the guitar and studied Hendrix and Slash before discovering jazz and guitarists like Wes Montgomery and Django Reinhardt. After an injury forced a break from playing, I returned to the guitar, and it was when I picked up a nylon-string instrument that I began focusing on composition. I suppose I draw on a multitude of influences: Johann Sebastian Bach, J Dilla, Sly Stone, Emahoy, Nils Frahm, Eric Satie, Fela Kuti, Frank Sinatra, Toumani Diabaté, Miles, Joao Gilberto, Duke Ellington, Nirvana, D’Angelo. It might not sound like it, but they and so many more are in my music somewhere!
‘Hypnos’ represents a moment in which all these influences disappeared into the background, they are there fizzing away in my subconscious and I guess in the muscle memory inherent in the way I play guitar, however I when I wrote these pieces the process felt pretty liberating, honest and free of any aspirations I might of previously had to comply or fit in with any one genre. I wanted to record the guitar honestly and without excessive production but I also wanted to bathe the sound of the guitar, or cushion it, in something atmospheric, and harmonically supportive. The analogue majesty of the Hammond, and played with the sensitivity and implicit soul of Mr. Nathaniel Ledwitch, served this role perfectly. I also love that the combo of nylon string guitar and Hammond organ is an unusual pairing. Sonically the Hammond is so rich and even when played softly and minimalistic still evokes gospel, jazz and funk, music that is my forever love.”
‘The Moon’ is a quiet entry point into ‘Hypnos’: clear, intimate and gently hypnotic, with Katz’s guitar given space to breathe.
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