Blue Coloured Mountain provides fresh look into late musician Szymon's developing genius

The death of 23-year-old Szymon Borzestowski in December 2012 after a battle with mental illness left parents Anna and Andrzej without a son and siblings Eva, Kubush and Dom without a brother.

What has provided some solace has been Szymon's incredible music, which has touched thousands of people around the globe.

Unfortunately during his lifetime Szymon's musical genius was only known to a handful of people outside his family, like EMI's Mark Holland and Craig Hawker.

Yet that all changed with the posthumous release of his debut album Tigersapp in 2015.

The album received rave reviews, earned an ARIA nomination for Best Adult Contemporary Album and won legions of fans who were bewitched by Szymon's innovative blend of folk, pop and electronica.

What made Tigersapp even more amazing was the fact it was the work of a teenager using rudimentary bedroom equipment. His potential was only beginning to be explored.

Four years on the Borzestowski family will on Friday release the second, and likely final chapter, in Szymon's musical journey with Blue Coloured Mountain.

"It's an honour to be releasing this on his behalf and to have this amazing legacy, the music we have, his voice that we can hear," Szymon's older brother Kubush said.

"It's sometimes a mixed emotion. It's bittersweet and not how we ever imagined this would be, but we definitely looked forward to the day that we would have his music out there for people to listen to.

"We'd always hear snippets and ideas and saw how much joy it brought him, the whole process, and also when he was happy with a song we saw that and it brought him so much joy.

"For us it's such a beautiful thing. It's more than sadness. It's just bittersweet."

Blue Coloured Mountain features seven tracks that were written after Tigersapp during Szymon's final years from 2010 to 2012.

The tracks were recorded as MP3s and mixed by Szymon. How they appear on the record is exactly the way he left them.

"Nothing was changed with the tracks so these are his original mixes he did for himself and that's all we've got to work with," Kubush said. "But it's a beautiful thing because that's how he left his songs."

Despite Szymon's battle with depression deepening during the making of Blue Coloured Mountain there aren't any obvious signs of despair and melancholy.

Rather, the music is bright, joyful and adventurous and more experimental than Tigersapp.

The whimsical folk of Orestes draws comparisons with Golden from Tigersapp, while Blue Mountain Coloured and it's falsetto hook of "catchapoo" is evidence Szymon was rapidly fine-tuning his pop melodies, groove and vocals.

The rhythmically-driven Anhalt sees Szymon exploring synths and Untitled is rooted in his love of jazz.

"I think his voice was getting better," Kubush said. "He was getting quite good at recording, but still using quite basic gear, but he was developing.

"Tigersapp was literally his first body of work that he'd really worked on, so it was only just the start.

"You could see how talented he was and I feel like he was going to another level with his songwriting sonically and vocally too, understanding his voice and where it sits best."

Critics such as Hoodoo Gurus frontman Dave Faulkner described Tigersapp as music people would be listening to for "decades to come" and Szymon's older sister Eva Irwin believes Blue Coloured Mountain possesses the same qualities.

"It's been almost 10 years since he composed all of this music and it's still so fresh," Eva said. "It's incredible. It feels like it was written now.

"He always wanted his music to be timeless, and it really has been."

REVIEW: Borzestowski siblings complete beautiful recreation of Szymon's music

Due to younger brother Dom living in London with his rock band Gang Of Youths, there are no immediate plans for the Borzestowski family to perform another In Loving Memory of Szymon concert, like they did in 2016 at Lizotte's and Splendour In The Grass.

However, the family is certainly eager to.

Since the release of Tigersapp four years ago the Borzestowski family have received a consistent stream of messages from fans.

It's no surprise. Szymon's music and story have fostered emotional connections.

READ MORE: Gang Of Youth drummer Dom Borzestowski opens up about his brother Szymon's musical legacy

His music has an audience of 76,000 monthly listeners on Spotify and Golden has reached more than 2.5 million streams.

"It's so special and beautiful to see how it impacts different people," Eva said. "It touches people in all different ways.

"We get lots of different messages and emails from people right around the world just telling us how the music has inspired them and given them hope and they've connected with the story and the music.

"It goes beyond just listening to music and they can really hear Szymon and really get a sense of who he was a person through the music and the lyrics and they feel a connection and a connection to the story and have that sense of hope.

"It's been a real blessing to us as a family to hear from so many people who have loved it and been impacted by it."

Lifeline 13 11 44

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