Almost two decades ago, an English musician visiting Cyprus stood outside Varosha, struggling to comprehend how a place of such scale could have been abandoned. On Friday, that experience will culminate in the release of a concept album inspired entirely by the ghost town.
Written by Terence Overall and his musical collaborator Shaun Baker, VAROSHA is described as a “respectful musical reflection” on a place whose story continues to resonate both in Cyprus and around the world.
Ahead of the album’s release, Overall, who records under the name A Solitary Statue, spoke to en.philenews about the project’s origins, the years of research behind it and what he hopes Cypriot listeners will take from the music.
A brief history of Varosha
In the early 1970s, Varosha was a renowned luxury beach resort that attracted visitors from around the world, including Hollywood stars.
That changed abruptly in August 1974, when Turkish forces invaded Cyprus following a coup, prompting nearly 40,000 residents to flee their homes and businesses.
The area was subsequently fenced off and remained largely inaccessible for decades, leaving its streets, shops and hotels suspended in time.
About the artists
Overall and Baker began making music together as teenagers in the early 1980s. Although they dreamed of pursuing music professionally, careers, families and the realities of adult life eventually took priority.
They nevertheless continued writing, recording and experimenting together over the following three decades, driven primarily by their shared love of music.
“VAROSHA is the result of that journey,” Overall said.
“It represents decades of musical curiosity, friendship and experimentation finally finding an outlet. I don’t see it as the culmination of a traditional music career; I see it as the moment when a lifelong creative partnership was finally given the opportunity to be heard.”
The inspiration behind the album
Overall said the idea for the album did not emerge fully while he stood outside the abandoned city. Instead, it developed gradually after he returned home and began researching Varosha and the wider history of Cyprus.
What began as curiosity slowly became a mission to understand how an entire city had been abandoned and left largely untouched. As his research deepened, he came to see Varosha not simply as a ghost town, but as an entry point into the broader story of the island.
He said: “By the time we began recording it seriously, VAROSHA was no longer simply about a deserted city I had seen in 2008. It had become an attempt to honour the people behind the history and to explore how memory, identity and place continue to echo across generations.
“So the moment standing on the beach outside Varosha planted the seed, but the album itself grew slowly over many years. In many ways, it was the research, the conversations and the gradual accumulation of understanding that turned a powerful memory into a complete artistic work.”
Translating history into sound
The initial plan was to focus primarily on the abandoned city, using ambient sounds, drones and sound design to evoke its empty streets and buildings.
However, as Overall and Baker learned more about Cyprus, they concluded that Varosha formed only one chapter of a much larger story. The project thendeveloped from an atmospheric record into a narrative album requiring greater movement and emotion.
Rather than attempting to imitate traditional Cypriot music, which they believed would have been disingenuous, the pair drew on their own British electronic, new wave and ambient influences.
Overall concentrated heavily on production and sound design, while Baker brought strong musical instinct to the compositions. The album begins with brighter, more optimistic sounds before becoming increasingly aggressive and fragmented, incorporating heavy percussion, radio transmissions, helicopters and aircraft as the narrative reaches the events of 1974.
Its closing tracks are more spacious and reflective, switching the focus from conflict to memory, loss and the passage of time.
“Shaun and I are both children of the new wave and electronic era of the late 1970s and 1980s. Those were the sounds that first inspired us to make music. As we’ve grown older, our influences have expanded enormously to include ambient, Industrial, IDM, progressive rock, cinematic electronic music and more experimental forms of composition. VAROSHA sits naturally somewhere within those worlds.
“The different eras of the island are reflected less through specific historical musical styles and more through changes in atmosphere, harmony, rhythm and production. This Paradise has a brighter, more expansive quality that reflects the beauty and optimism we associated with Cyprus before division. The middle of the album becomes more aggressive and fragmented, while the closing pieces become increasingly reflective and spacious.
“So rather than trying to recreate local musical traditions, we used the musical language that is genuinely ours. We felt that honesty was important. The album is a British electronic and progressive interpretation of a Cypriot story, created with respect, humility and a deep admiration for the island.”
What the artists hope Cypriots will hear
Overall stressed that the album was not intended to explain the island’s history to Cypriots or to present political conclusions.
“It was created by two British music producers who became moved by a place and then spent years trying to understand the human story behind it,” Overall said.
“If someone in Cyprus listens and feels that we approached their history with humility, compassion and a genuine desire to remember rather than judge, I will feel the album has achieved what I hoped it would.”
The possibility of a Cyprus presentation
Although the pair would be honoured to bring VAROSHA to Cyprus, Overall said the album could not easily be reproduced by a conventional live band.
The project was assembled layer by layer in the studio through composition, production and sound design. Rather than staging a standard concert, they envisage an immersive listening event, a surround-sound presentation or a performance incorporating visuals and narration.
VAROSHA will be released on 7 August. It can be pre-saved here.
Alongside the album, Overall and Baker have produced an illustrated electronic press kit explaining the historical background and narrative behind each composition.
