BC25 Unveils "Unearthed, Pt. 2" And We Connected With The Visionaries Behind Its Transformative Sound
- STAFF
- 5 days ago
- 8 min read
By: Staff
BC25 shapes a cinematic, intimate experience that moves with quiet power and leaves a lasting imprint
BC25 enters the world with a quiet kind of magnitude, the kind that does not announce itself but arrives and suddenly everything feels different. Their latest album "Unearthed, Pt. 2" is not just a release, it is a world that breathes slowly and asks the listener to follow. This project is born from fragments. Actual fragments. Rediscovered cassette tapes handed over by a mentor who knew his time was ending, sounds captured long before anyone imagined they would be touched again. BC25 did not build songs out of nostalgia. They listened. They let silence in. They let the past speak first.
There is something powerful about music that begins before its creators ever enter the room. These pieces lived their first life, then waited. When Barbonus pressed play again, it triggered a question that became a mission. What do you do with a gift that arrives from someone who is gone? You answer it. Not with loudness or control, but with presence. Vela Sorell’s voice does not perform. It enters like breath. It sits inside the sound rather than on top of it. Mark arrives at the very end, ensuring the emotion stays intact while shaping the final temperature of the work. Together they form a trio that does not chase perfection, they protect what is already there.
There is a feeling inside "Unearthed, Pt. 2" that something sacred is unfolding. It is not grief. It is not remembrance. It is something closer to witnessing. BC25 approaches every decision with restraint. They choose what remains and what disappears. They let a song exist without forcing it into form. The project feels like an archive that chose its own resurrection.
We spoke with BC25 about the creation of this chapter, the weight of legacy, the quiet trust between collaborators, and what it means to let a project end on purpose. Here is that conversation.
Keep scrolling to get into it with BC25.
Here’s how it went:
Begin Interview:
Hello BC25, we’re thrilled to have you here for this interview! We've had an amazing time exploring your music and diving into your creative journey. Now, we’re even more intrigued to get a deeper look into both your brand and your personal and professional inspirations.
Q. After spending time with Unearthed, Pt. 2, it comes across as deeply intentional and emotionally present. At its core, what is this album truly about for you? Why was this the right name for this chapter of the project, and what does it signal about where the music lives emotionally?
A.
Barbonus: There wasn’t a moment where we said, “Now we’re doing Part II, and it will be different.” In spring and summer we were working on all eighteen pieces at once. Everything was open, everything half-finished, and at some point the project became too heavy — emotionally and practically. It felt like standing in a room with all the windows open and no air moving.
Vela: That’s when I suggested we stop and choose. Not because the other songs weren’t important, but because we needed space again. We focused on the pieces that were already breathing and released them as Part I, just to clear our heads. Only afterwards did Part II start to feel like its own place.
Barbonus: Part II isn’t about starting over. It’s about staying. Once Part I was out, the remaining songs no longer felt like unfinished work waiting for approval. They were simply there, asking for attention rather than resolution. That changed the way we listened.
Vela: The response to Part I mattered to me personally. It helped me trust my own voice in this context — not as something added on top of the music, but as something that belongs inside it. With Part II I felt freer to take things away. On pieces like Sanctum, we stripped everything back until only what was necessary remained. That’s where the music lives for me now: close, reduced, unforced.
Q. This project began with rediscovered cassette fragments tied to personal history. When you first pressed play on those tapes again, what was the feeling or realization that told you this needed to become more than a private experience?
A.
Barbonus: When I first pressed play again, there wasn’t a clear feeling like “this needs to become a project.” It was more uncertainty. The cassette came from a friend and mentor who knew he was dying. He handed it to me and said, “Make something of it.” I didn’t ask questions. I nodded. That was it.
After he passed, I couldn’t listen to it for a long time. And when I finally did, years later, the tape was in terrible condition — distorted, uneven, almost collapsing in places. I didn’t know what “making something of it” even meant anymore. Restore it? Leave it alone? Add to it? I was stuck.
What changed wasn’t a decision to go public. It was realizing that not engaging with it was also a decision. And probably not the one he meant.
Q. How did this wonderful team of Barbonus, Vela Sorell, and Mark first connect with one another, and what made it immediately clear that this collaboration was the right environment for handling such delicate material?
A.
Vela: We already knew each other through band work. I was playing drums and was comfortable there. Singing wasn’t something I was trying to move into. One night after a session the others went for a beer. I stayed behind, heard a quiet guitar figure on the monitors, and asked if I could try a line. No plan, no setup. I sang into the talkback mic — no headphones, just the room and breath.
Barbonus: I remember the pressure in the room changing — like opening a window. Her phrasing sat exactly where the guitar breathed. Nothing fancy, just time and air. I hadn’t been looking for a singer. I didn’t even know yet that there would be singing. But after that moment, the music stopped feeling archived and started feeling present.
Mark came in later, at the mastering stage. I’d heard of him from a completely different context, but I knew this material needed an analog approach. He calls himself “just a tape guy,” but he listens carefully. That mattered more than anything.
Q. Each of you plays a very specific role in bringing these fragments into the present. How would you describe your individual responsibilities within BC25, and in what ways do those roles naturally support and strengthen one another?
A.
Barbonus: I was used to making decisions alone. I have an internal instinct for my own projects. With this material, that instinct was gone. These weren’t my sounds, and I couldn’t tell anymore when I was helping or just interfering.
Vela: I simplify. That’s probably my main role. When things start circling, I say so. At some point I told him, “I am not a loop.” That became a rule. If I say it, we stop and step back.
Barbonus: And I listen. Fully. Because without that intervention, I would still be perfecting something that doesn’t want perfection. At the same time, Vela follows my ideas — sometimes I only say “idea,” not a melody or arrangement, and she understands the direction. It works because there’s no fight for control.
Q. Silence, tape noise, and imperfections are treated as meaningful elements rather than things to resolve. How do you think this approach shapes the final sound and the emotional impression it leaves on the listener?
A.
Vela: Silence wasn’t a concept we started with. Some songs aren’t quiet at all — Run the Lights, The Reckoning. And The Reckoning almost didn’t make it. I struggled with it, especially the mantra at the end. It felt like I might fail vocally. Barbonus wanted to drop it. I asked for one more take. That one stayed.
Barbonus: What mattered was knowing when a song couldn’t be repaired without losing itself. Some original instrument choices were strange, even uncomfortable — but changing them never felt like an option. If something drifted too far from where it came from, we let it go.
Noise was allowed, but not blindly. We left hiss in some places, but when mastering made it overpowering, we adjusted. Not to erase history, but to keep it from dominating the present.
Q. Vela, your vocal performances feel less like overlays and more like quiet companions to the original recordings. How did you approach singing in a way that honored the fragility and history of the source material?
A.
Vela: Singing wasn’t a decision. It just happened. There was space, and the fragment needed a voice that wouldn’t push it forward or pull it apart. I treated my voice like accompaniment rather than performance.
That first talkback take shaped everything. There was no goal behind it, no intention to “add vocals.” It just felt right to respond. The restraint came naturally — staying close, staying inside the sound, not stepping in front of it.
Q. Barbonus, much of this project seems rooted in deep listening rather than constant decision making. How did your relationship to authorship shift while working with music that already existed in another time?
A.
Barbonus: My first thought was: this isn’t mine. He was a musician in a way I’m not. He thought in sounds and structures instinctively. I don’t. What I know is language.
He once told me everyone should do what they’re best at. So I started writing texts — not lyrics over melodies, but conversations. As if I were answering him, and he were answering back. That’s how many of the songs are built.
Only with Vela did authorship shift. The music widened. Before BC25 it was his music. After BC25, it became ours.
Q. Mark’s mastering subtly shapes the emotional temperature of the album. How did you approach the final stage of the process to ensure the archival philosophy of BC25 remained intact and nothing felt overstated?
A.
Barbonus: I was careful. I sent Six Strings Left first as a test. When it came back, it was clear Mark had to do the whole album.
There was a real concern that analog mastering might bring things forward we hadn’t noticed — especially noise. Mark hears that too. He says he’s “just a tape guy,” but he listens deeply. When something felt too exposed, we corrected it before going further. Mastering can’t perform miracles. It can only reveal what’s already there.
Q. BC25 exists outside traditional release cycles and performance expectations. How has working without those pressures changed the way you experience time, patience, and creativity as artists?
A.
Barbonus: It may sound timeless, but it wasn’t without pressure. We had a window — a few intense months. Other commitments were returning: band work, unfinished songs, things that couldn’t be paused much longer.
Vela: We worked long days. When nothing moved anymore, we’d go to the open-air cinema late at night. After the film, we’d walk back toward the studio, talk, laugh, and then keep going. Not much sleep. A lot of coffee. But it never felt heavy in the wrong way.
Q. Looking ahead, what does the future of this collaboration look like for the three of you, both creatively and philosophically?
A.
Barbonus: This archive is closed. There was one cassette. We didn’t want to stretch it endlessly. A project needs an end to exist at all.
That doesn’t mean collaboration ends. I have other unfinished ideas, unrelated to this archive. We touched on a few quietly, without intention. Nothing like the intensity of that summer — and it couldn’t be.
Vela: That’s where I’m more cautious. I don’t know yet what comes next. I only know what made this possible — and I wouldn’t want to lose that.
Q. As this archival journey continues to unfold, what do you hope listeners carry with them after spending time inside the quiet world of BC25?
A.
Barbonus: Someone wrote about Lines I Never Sent: “This song is truly beautiful and meaningful, I’m so glad I found this song.” That sentence says everything I could hope for. If something we made can be found quietly and stays with someone, that’s enough.
Vela: I hope listeners notice they listened more closely than usual. It doesn’t have to linger. It can pass through, do its work, and leave a small shift behind.
BC25, thank you so much, we appreciate you taking the time to talk to us!
End Interview