ARE YOU SURE YOU’RE READY/’DAY FOR NIGHT’/ SP ALBUM UPDATE
Occasional, nay consistent, braggart that I am, I’m sometimes prone to overpromising what lay in Santa’s Magic Bag; as I did when I said all songs were written. This *was true, in the sense that at the moment we started the process of ‘MTAE’ (MONUMENTS TO AN ELEGY, forthwith) I had a good old pile of USDA-approved riffs, choruses, and blind alley sad-songs. Enter Herr Howard, and you know the rest: lots of teeth ringing about modern music et al, and the snooze inducing process of repeating what I already knew how to do; albeit faster, brighter, and with ‘more lift’.
So here we go again, and yes, I’ve got plenty ‘o tuneage (to paraphrase that Teutonic hippie I used to live with), but do I have the heart to recast what I already despise; which to be clear is the process of stripping back intellect to reveal the pure essence of hook, hook, hook…
Some may cry boring, but I call it being savvy in an unsophisticated world, for without a new, creative engine to drive SP-Beyond, what’s the gosh-darned point of trying to reach the kidz? (At this point)…
And though I think you’ll find MTAE fab (that is if you are ready for change, or you like a good song above an indulgent one, or you’re not like my friend Kanako-san who thinks she’s heard all I’d have to offer), I’m planning on upping the game even higher with this next fella. By engaging in what I behind the scenes would call an Adore-like process; i.e. where the production and song marry as one from the start; and NOT in some process of reverse engineering ;where songs not meant to be tenderized are pummeled and reconstituted with some digital hammer until crystalline clear.
Which you see makes me laugh, because I started doing that alt-process right around the time that process became ubiquitous in pop/rap/blah blah music. So yes, I’m saying kindly I was there long ago and abandoned it simply because it f’d up a good thing (or that thing-beast that existed circa 1990-1997).
So yeah, I’m back with beats and blips, but faint not ye lovers of noise, for the guitar will be with us along the way. Because thought I drop the A-door verbage, my plan is something kinetic and shoe gazery; or SD-y for you braggarts.
Will it work? Who knows? And shall it include those songs already written? Some. But most will be fresh-hewn, because in that world the beat is king, as is the gizmo you run the beat through and so on.
At least I’ve still got all the old gear no matter which way we go…
W.P.C.