Earthly Powers is Boa's 19th studio album, the title represents a commentary on the state of the world and is a tribute to one of his favorite books to boot: "Earthly Powers" by British author Anthony Burgess, a novel of the century published in Germany in 1980 under the title "Der Fürst der Phantome". Legendary is the first sentence, which is one of the best first sentences in world literature: "It was the afternoon of my eighty-first birthday, and I was in bed with my catamite when Ali announced that the archbishop had come to see me." Meaning the archbishop of Malta, for that is where this story begins. "I know many of the rooms where the story is set in Malta", says Boa. He had moved to the island many years ago to escape the pressure the music industry was putting on Germany's biggest indie star. A year ago, he left Malta. "The country was once a great place of freedom. But it has changed, today it is corrupt, hypocritical, spooky."The murder for hire of investigative journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia was the dramatic low point. And Boa folded his tents.
You can think of the twelve songs on Earthly Powers as episodes that tell of the times. Boa sings about the present, looking back at the ways he's traveled over the years. "At its core, it's an album about freedom," he says. "It tells about the fact that it is worth fighting for freedom. But also about how many people today confuse freedom with selfishness and hedonism."
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