mmd

The Arrangement

How can we expect anything but eruption
When we treat you this way?
How can we excuse your decimation
When our provocation is clear?
Indignation spawns indignation, just as much as
Violence breeds violence.
Farmers of doom, we reap what we sow.
Keepers of the loom, we undo all that is known.
The more we turn the screws
The more you ungracefully squirm
The more we grind you down
The more you set to burn
We created you by destroying you.
We lost you when we found you.
You’ve turned being broken
Into a state of functionalism
You’ve defined your constant loss
As the norm of our idealism.

After some delays, it is finally up and ready to go…

Of all my older albums, 2 Smargaid Maerd remains as one I don’t feel disappointed about, and if I’m in a good enough mood I’m actually very proud of it! Now many years after the fact it is easy to look back at earlier work like this and frown upon certain technical shortcomings and artistic immaturity employed in the making of this music. In 2003, when most of this work was done, I only had very limited and lofi means of music production, and I was far from being in a stable emotional state to be producing pieces of high sophistication. Mind you, I’ll probably look back upon myself now in 10 years time and think the same thing, hence the problem of looking backwards. Nevertheless, these songs seem to strike an emotional chord with people, and with the limited audience it has reached it has spawned a life of its own beyond my own consideration. Well, despite the blemishes, I still love it – so I am keen to get it out there to a wider audience if possible. So if you’re in the mood for some highly individualistic composition; that is ‘pop’ yet ‘experimental’; lush but edgy; and highly emotional homebrew electronica – this album is for you.

Hence, here we are on Bandcamp! The original CD-quality FLAC files have been uploaded: so if you’re feeling so inclined to spend $10AUD, then a copy of the whole thing is yours. But that’s not all (as he puts on his Tim Shaw Voice), you get a re-organised PDF package of all the original artwork and lyrics; plus, there are three hidden bonus remix tracks as well! These are not available anywhere else. Because Bandcamp is so neat, all the files come in whatever format of your choice, all tagged and ready to go for your portable playing pleasure.

The three remix tracks are Absolutely Doomed, My Heart Only Beats For You, and There Are No Answers – Only Dub. They have been remixed and mastered only in the last few weeks. The originals were very lofi and harsh sounding, so it was a good opportunity to put my new skills and equipment to the test. I figured if I could make these old sonic disasters sound good, then I’m doing ok. They were upgraded to 96khz mixing, and in the final stages of the mastering were run through my new 12AU7 ECC82 Telefunken NOS ribbed plate tubes (read on in earlier posts about the technical details). There’s a lot of lofi-intensity still inside these mixes, but at the same time they should be smooth and sparkle with clarity. The remixes will give a new angle on the old songs, perhaps focusing their emotional impact. Beyond that, I’ll leave it to you to explore them.

Thank you so much for your support and interest.

In the previous post I mentioned I was working on my next album The Paradox. Well for someone who thought Google were pretty evil a few years ago, I’ve sure ended up using their tools a lot. You can only rage against something in a powerless way for so long, so I figured I might as well go with the flow. The particular tool in use for this project is Google Documents’ spreadsheet tool. Recently they’ve changed the options so you can make the sheet public (but not editable by the public). So you can see when I make changes to it, and check on the general progress of the album. The link is apparently thus:

The Paradox: Masterplan

Good luck with that, I hope it works. Like I mentioned earlier, the tool is very handy if you are trying to attempt an album project, especially if you feel lost in all the different stages. It’s a lot to organise. So I feel more confident about it all having it mapped out ahead of me. It is motivating too in that I look at it and think “oooh, all these cool songs to work on, which part do I feel like tackling today?” My categories are particular to my project, but if you use the sheet then you can use whatever is applicable to what you’re doing.

I’ve read of artists in recording studios approaching album projects in a similar way, but instead using a chalkboard or whiteboard. This is the same thing, but for the geeks

Gosh, the weeks slip by so quick; Autumn into the depths of winter just like that. And here we are in the middle of it, freezing our fingers and toes off. I’m now wearing three sets of socks at once! It has been a while since I’ve blogged here, so it is time for a little general update on things. Read the rest of this entry »

I’m writing to you here from Armidale, NSW Australia, on a crisp autumn morning. It was only 1 degree centigrade as the sun came up, so we took the indulgence of having the bar heater on in the bedroom to keep us and Maxwell (on the floor) nice and toasted. We’ve finally finished all of our moving interstate, finishing off on the weekend with moving Max and Gus (the cat) down from Brisbane… Read the rest of this entry »