Suppose I might as well update on everything then. Not that anyone listens though :P
Anger of a Nation, Doom To Us All
Yep, old album, but still... anyway. I updated some of the tracks, well, to be honest, I actually took them back to their original state. When we recorded this for the first time, Medusa and Vampire Rising took a day each to record. Attila kindly mixed and mastered version for us then, which we took away. When it came to the final mixdown, I did it myself, and Attila added some "fire" to the drums. However, this reflected badly, as the drums were so damn loud they shorted out in the left speaker/headphone when you listen to it. The newer versions also had less keyboard in them, something I thought was better at the time. However, now I don't. So, to cut a long story short, I relocated the originals of Medusa and Vampire Rising, I pushed up their gain levels a bit to fit better in line with the rest of the demo, and decided that they ruled. I then uploaded the Vampire Rising one to Myspace, and it's not been complained about yet.
I also fixed the intro to Perks, which was slightly screwed due to Attila trying to record both the sound effects and keyboards on one track, mixing the sound effects first, then switching over to keyboard and mixing the rest, which ended up in the SFX being really low in the mix. I boosted the gain on the intro a bit, and now it's properly in line with the volume of the rest. I also boosted the volume of Moon Tubes and Rule Britannia a bit.
That should be it for edits to this demo. I'm not going to turn into George Lucas.
A Brief Repose Amidst The Screams of Torture
Still no real update on this, save to say that James has finished recording his parts on Adriatic Splendour. However, he still hasn't sent it to me, so I can't call the album finished yet. I will say though, that the sound recording of this album is crap. My drumming is crap, and so some songs are pretty bad in that regard, especially as I recorded guitar before drums, which is odd. But it's hard for me to think of drumming before guitaring, which means that it's often out of time. The worst song on the album in this regard is My Vice is Sacrifice, but then again, it's supposed to be a funny song anyway.
The Perks of Being In Office
Yep, I'm going to release it as a single. Long overdue, but forced by the fact that I would like to get at least one thing released this year. I'll probably have a queue of two albums waiting to be released by then, but at the current rate, I'm not likely to have anything out before January. So, yeah, this'll go out. I'll have to work on some art for it though, which is annoying. Chris did produce a stunning cover though, which I'm really pleased with.
Elemental
No, that's not the actual cover. The recording is nearly done, just Fire and Fur Elise to go. I left Fire until last because it's the most technically demanding (and because I still need to find more Eastern European scales to put riffs over the top with), and Fur Elise because it's the least important in terms of the album. I did do the vocals for Air and Water, finally, and did a loop of Water to make it long enough, but now Blade's decided that he's going to finish off Water like he said he was, which means it could be a couple of hours long :P
Other than that, nothing much to say about the album.
To Sever Ties With All Of Mankind
Yep, that is to be the title of the next album after Elemental. The title is representative of a recurrent theme in the lyrics, and that's the severe non-humanity I'm feeling at the moment. Some lyrics, like "Bloodied Earth," for example, are positively anti-human.
So far, I've pretty much got the basis of all the lyrics, just need to finish writing some of them, and I've started on the tunes. A brief idea of a tracklist is forming:
1. In Shadowy Form It Confronts
2. Les Souffrances Des Mortels
3. Ignition Sequence Countdown to Demise
4. The Night of Samhain
5. Bloodied Earth
6. ...And Chaos Ensues...
7. The Betrayal
8. Piano Sonata
9. Ode to Camomile and Basilisk
10. Sonnet
11. Tear-Maiden
12. Light of the Seelie, Truth of the Unseelie, Life of the Fey
13. A Nightmare of Day
Brief analysis:
Structure: I've structured it so that the first 8 tracks are locked between two instrumentals, and are arranged in triads. Track one and eight are the instrumentals, tracks 2 and 5 are the ones with anti-human tendancies, 3 and 6 and the political ones, 4 and 7 are the personal ones. Then, 9 and 10 are my moments of insanity (indeed, Ode to Camomile and Basilisk is my oddest song title ever), 11 and 12 are fantasy stories (11 is the story of Turin and Nienor from Narn i Hin Hurin, out of Tolkien's Silmarillion, and 12 is a brief glimpse into the world of the Irish sidhe), and 13 is a standalone: a massive ghost story. I've not even finished the lyrics, and it's already longer than the combined wordcount of my previous two longest songs, wordcount wise (Vampire Rising and Water). Thus I can only surmise that it'll be an epic.
Lyrical themes:
1. In Shadowy Form It Confronts: none
2. Les Souffrances Des Mortels: All in French, this song is truly bizarre. Possibly the smallest wordcount ever for a song (82), it surmises something apocalyptic. It ends in a slightly silly way reminiscient of Ice.
3. Ignition Sequence Countdown to Demise: Politically motivated, and inspired by the Einstein quote, "I do not know with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones."
4. The Night of Samhain: Sort of a treatise on the hypocrisy of religion, combined with a large dose of my personal opinion, plus stories of the atrocities people associate with Halloween/Samhain.
5. Bloodied Earth: Another anti-human song, it focus' on a death in the forest, and how animals have a practical way to dispose of the corpse, whereas humans merely close it off in a box of wood to let it rot, essentially depriving nature of food.
6. ...And Chaos Ensues...: Political/religious thing, pretty much telling the stories of both the French Revolution and the Crusades, and how chaos was born from them.
7. The Betrayal: Personal thing, was written after I'd had a bit of a stab in the back from two dudes I knew (and was competing with) for the adminship of a site. Pretty much, we'd all been waiting for ages, then they snuck off and told the network admin that I wasn't in the running anymore, when I was. He gave them adminship :P Funnily though, I'm the admin there now, so... :P I hypothetically set it in a village though.
8. Piano Sonata: none
9. Ode to Camomile and Basilisk: Odd as hell. Seriously. These were the first lyrics I wrote for this album, and would disregard them other than the fact that they're pretty damn funny. I wrote them on a bus, which is quite funny.
10. Sonnet: Probably not going to be the actual title, but it'll be a Shakespearian Sonnet in style (14 lines of Iambic Pentameter, ababcdcdefefgg rhyme), and really metaphorical and odd.
11. Tear-Maiden: Pretty much just Narn i Hin Hurin from The Silmarillion, but in fewer words and with some really funny bits.
12. Light of the Seelie, Truth of the Unseelie, Life of the Fey: Probably not it's actual title, but it just focus' on the different ways of life for the two courts of faery, the seelie and unseelie.
13. A Nightmare of Day: Again, probably not it's final title. This is the first ever first-person song I've written, and it's heavily influenced by Henry James' Turn of the Screw. Pretty much the average people see ghosts - people fight off ghosts - ghosts kidnap someone - another goes to find - gets trapped with ghost - tries to kill it - fails - prisoner awakes and miraculously calls spirits to help kill ghosts - happy ending - not happy ending story.I would post musical ideas, but I'm not finished with them yet.
Anyway, that's that for this really long update. Have fun :P
Anger of a Nation, Doom To Us All
Yep, old album, but still... anyway. I updated some of the tracks, well, to be honest, I actually took them back to their original state. When we recorded this for the first time, Medusa and Vampire Rising took a day each to record. Attila kindly mixed and mastered version for us then, which we took away. When it came to the final mixdown, I did it myself, and Attila added some "fire" to the drums. However, this reflected badly, as the drums were so damn loud they shorted out in the left speaker/headphone when you listen to it. The newer versions also had less keyboard in them, something I thought was better at the time. However, now I don't. So, to cut a long story short, I relocated the originals of Medusa and Vampire Rising, I pushed up their gain levels a bit to fit better in line with the rest of the demo, and decided that they ruled. I then uploaded the Vampire Rising one to Myspace, and it's not been complained about yet.
I also fixed the intro to Perks, which was slightly screwed due to Attila trying to record both the sound effects and keyboards on one track, mixing the sound effects first, then switching over to keyboard and mixing the rest, which ended up in the SFX being really low in the mix. I boosted the gain on the intro a bit, and now it's properly in line with the volume of the rest. I also boosted the volume of Moon Tubes and Rule Britannia a bit.
That should be it for edits to this demo. I'm not going to turn into George Lucas.
A Brief Repose Amidst The Screams of Torture
Still no real update on this, save to say that James has finished recording his parts on Adriatic Splendour. However, he still hasn't sent it to me, so I can't call the album finished yet. I will say though, that the sound recording of this album is crap. My drumming is crap, and so some songs are pretty bad in that regard, especially as I recorded guitar before drums, which is odd. But it's hard for me to think of drumming before guitaring, which means that it's often out of time. The worst song on the album in this regard is My Vice is Sacrifice, but then again, it's supposed to be a funny song anyway.
The Perks of Being In Office
Yep, I'm going to release it as a single. Long overdue, but forced by the fact that I would like to get at least one thing released this year. I'll probably have a queue of two albums waiting to be released by then, but at the current rate, I'm not likely to have anything out before January. So, yeah, this'll go out. I'll have to work on some art for it though, which is annoying. Chris did produce a stunning cover though, which I'm really pleased with.
Elemental
No, that's not the actual cover. The recording is nearly done, just Fire and Fur Elise to go. I left Fire until last because it's the most technically demanding (and because I still need to find more Eastern European scales to put riffs over the top with), and Fur Elise because it's the least important in terms of the album. I did do the vocals for Air and Water, finally, and did a loop of Water to make it long enough, but now Blade's decided that he's going to finish off Water like he said he was, which means it could be a couple of hours long :P
Other than that, nothing much to say about the album.
To Sever Ties With All Of Mankind
Yep, that is to be the title of the next album after Elemental. The title is representative of a recurrent theme in the lyrics, and that's the severe non-humanity I'm feeling at the moment. Some lyrics, like "Bloodied Earth," for example, are positively anti-human.
So far, I've pretty much got the basis of all the lyrics, just need to finish writing some of them, and I've started on the tunes. A brief idea of a tracklist is forming:
1. In Shadowy Form It Confronts
2. Les Souffrances Des Mortels
3. Ignition Sequence Countdown to Demise
4. The Night of Samhain
5. Bloodied Earth
6. ...And Chaos Ensues...
7. The Betrayal
8. Piano Sonata
9. Ode to Camomile and Basilisk
10. Sonnet
11. Tear-Maiden
12. Light of the Seelie, Truth of the Unseelie, Life of the Fey
13. A Nightmare of Day
Brief analysis:
Structure: I've structured it so that the first 8 tracks are locked between two instrumentals, and are arranged in triads. Track one and eight are the instrumentals, tracks 2 and 5 are the ones with anti-human tendancies, 3 and 6 and the political ones, 4 and 7 are the personal ones. Then, 9 and 10 are my moments of insanity (indeed, Ode to Camomile and Basilisk is my oddest song title ever), 11 and 12 are fantasy stories (11 is the story of Turin and Nienor from Narn i Hin Hurin, out of Tolkien's Silmarillion, and 12 is a brief glimpse into the world of the Irish sidhe), and 13 is a standalone: a massive ghost story. I've not even finished the lyrics, and it's already longer than the combined wordcount of my previous two longest songs, wordcount wise (Vampire Rising and Water). Thus I can only surmise that it'll be an epic.
Lyrical themes:
1. In Shadowy Form It Confronts: none
2. Les Souffrances Des Mortels: All in French, this song is truly bizarre. Possibly the smallest wordcount ever for a song (82), it surmises something apocalyptic. It ends in a slightly silly way reminiscient of Ice.
3. Ignition Sequence Countdown to Demise: Politically motivated, and inspired by the Einstein quote, "I do not know with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones."
4. The Night of Samhain: Sort of a treatise on the hypocrisy of religion, combined with a large dose of my personal opinion, plus stories of the atrocities people associate with Halloween/Samhain.
5. Bloodied Earth: Another anti-human song, it focus' on a death in the forest, and how animals have a practical way to dispose of the corpse, whereas humans merely close it off in a box of wood to let it rot, essentially depriving nature of food.
6. ...And Chaos Ensues...: Political/religious thing, pretty much telling the stories of both the French Revolution and the Crusades, and how chaos was born from them.
7. The Betrayal: Personal thing, was written after I'd had a bit of a stab in the back from two dudes I knew (and was competing with) for the adminship of a site. Pretty much, we'd all been waiting for ages, then they snuck off and told the network admin that I wasn't in the running anymore, when I was. He gave them adminship :P Funnily though, I'm the admin there now, so... :P I hypothetically set it in a village though.
8. Piano Sonata: none
9. Ode to Camomile and Basilisk: Odd as hell. Seriously. These were the first lyrics I wrote for this album, and would disregard them other than the fact that they're pretty damn funny. I wrote them on a bus, which is quite funny.
10. Sonnet: Probably not going to be the actual title, but it'll be a Shakespearian Sonnet in style (14 lines of Iambic Pentameter, ababcdcdefefgg rhyme), and really metaphorical and odd.
11. Tear-Maiden: Pretty much just Narn i Hin Hurin from The Silmarillion, but in fewer words and with some really funny bits.
12. Light of the Seelie, Truth of the Unseelie, Life of the Fey: Probably not it's actual title, but it just focus' on the different ways of life for the two courts of faery, the seelie and unseelie.
13. A Nightmare of Day: Again, probably not it's final title. This is the first ever first-person song I've written, and it's heavily influenced by Henry James' Turn of the Screw. Pretty much the average people see ghosts - people fight off ghosts - ghosts kidnap someone - another goes to find - gets trapped with ghost - tries to kill it - fails - prisoner awakes and miraculously calls spirits to help kill ghosts - happy ending - not happy ending story.I would post musical ideas, but I'm not finished with them yet.
Anyway, that's that for this really long update. Have fun :P
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