As you may know, I try to release my music on dates of significance, or that are at least significant to me. Well, yesterday happened to be my birthday. I released Elemental pretty close to the mark, but for this EP, I landed it right on the 31st, when I turned 37. Not that it felt like a particularly significant birthday, just a year closer to forty. It's okay, most of the lead actors from television shows and movies that I enjoy are around my age or older. Many are in their forties and looking like they're in their prime. So I'm not particularly stressed about inching closer to my forties. I'm actually kind of looking forward to it, though many days I'm not sure I'll get that far. That's my depression and suicidal ideation talking, which you may know I struggle with. They're the reasons I see a psychiatrist, a therapist, and attend group dialectical behavioral therapy sessions. Hopefully they'll help get me through the years. But I'm trying to ween myself off of medications, which may be responsible for my double-vision and dizziness. And my therapist thinks that, if he's doing his job right, I won't need him forever. In dialectical therapy, we graduate to new levels, of which I'm at level two. We work toward loosely formed and loosely structured meetings, that will eventually be determined by the individual as needed. So, I guess I'm saying that I shouldn't depend on therapy or drugs forever, at least I hope not.
Music is my own form of therapy. It keeps me occupied and optimistic, and keeps me looking forward. Since it doesn't make me much money at this point, it should really be just a hobby. I'm hoping that I'll eventually have a music-related career, such as sound engineering, until I can really call making music my career. Hopefully that will happen someday. But for now, I'm absorbed in making music, which I did almost feverishly over the months since releasing my last album, Saturn Ascending. I came up with eleven songs to choose from for Compromises. I could have made another full-length album, but this felt more like a step toward something that I'm hoping could rival Dialectical Observations and Saturn Ascending. This was more just for fun, to do a little experimentation, and to hone some of the skills I've been developing.
"The Same Boat" was fun. The piano riff, which the rest of the instrumentation stemmed from, was inspired by the opening of The Dresden Dolls' album Yes, Virginia, "Sex Changes." It was something rapid and hopefully catchy. The next component that was formed from it was the acoustic guitar, which I chose because I hadn't really done some acoustic rhythm guitar in a while, and I'd listened to my old song "Overdrive" recently. Because the piano ended up being in a major key, the guitar sounded kind of bouncy. It looked like I was going to end up with something on a more optimistic note. Because it looked like I was going to have something more acoustic, I chose some acoustic drum kits and used a lot of hand drums. The staccato strings added to this acoustic and bouncy feeling, but then, when I experimented with some synths to flesh this song out, it edged slightly toward an EDM tone, brought on by a rhythmic bass synth. I used a couple synths I'd used many times before: some "resonant cables" and the "transistor choir." However, nothing I could do could take away from this song's bouncy and fun feeling, which was okay with me. In the past it's bothered me when when I ended up composing more optimistic songs, as opposed to something dark or fierce. Not so much anymore. It's nice to do something uplifting to keep my spirits up.
"The Truth" was just an experiment in using layers of guitars with different distortions. That's something common in music published by Fluttery Records, which is a label I keep sending demos to. I really like almost everything they put out. Whenever I get an email of something new they've published, I immediately look it up on Apple Music, and am thrilled when I can find it and add it to my library. I'm almost never disappointed, and they pretty much always end up in my "Acoustic/Electric/Eclectic" playlist, and sometimes are even added to my "Another Soundtrack for Another Life" playlist. I was mostly inspired by Sleepstream for this song. I came up with a leading riff on some clean electric guitar, then layered a rhythm guitar with some distortion underneath. Copying the lead guitar on piano, I added some acoustic and orchestral notes to this song with some strings. The beats were inspired by the soundtrack to some television show, I can't remember which. I was going for some clicks on a wooden box and on the rim of a snare, but it doesn't really sound like that, does it? That's okay, I came up with an experimental beat that I really liked. So, all in all, this song was a lot of experimentation, and some fun metal in there. I keep on practicing at the metal guitar, as I think it adds a unique flavor to the mostly ambient and neoclassical songs I compose these days. So you'll notice a lot of metal notes to this EP, just like on Saturn Ascending.
"What the Hell" started out with some acoustic guitar inspired by the blues of the mythic Robert (his last name is different in a different accounts) who supposedly sold his soul to the devil to be the best. This character has been in the books of Charles de Lint, and on the television shows Supernatural and Timeless. I had just watched Timeless. And I came up with an acoustic guitar riff (it's actually two layers of acoustic guitar) that impressed me, and which I found instantly addictive. I thought I would incongruously add some electronic, post-industrial beats, which I programmed in note-by-note. These were a lot of fun. I just had a lot of fun with this song. The first bout of electric guitar was inspired by Nine Inch Nails. I thought adding some furious toms and snare, and some rapid hi-hat, would be fitting. Then I found myself entering a trip-hop interlude, somewhat similar to the restful "space" I inserted into "They Delving" and "Lily White." I gradually worked my way up to the main acoustic guitar riff, only to have it give out to some death-metal inspired electric guitar. It organically gave way to the bass, synths, and drums that had been hiding underneath. Unexpectedly, the acoustic bass, piano, and acoustic guitar from the rest of the song fit over this rapid drumming. This song worked out to be one of my new favorites, which I'll probably send out to radio stations, as soon as I get my act together.
Another new favorite is "For Simplicity's Sake." As the title suggests, the instrumentation for this song is quite simple. I think the piano for this song was inspired by the theme that plays on the DVD menu of season one of Falling Skies. That theme has also inspired the piano on the song I'm currently working on, "Causality." It's something that I think is elegant and beautiful in it's simplicity. I kept the strings graceful and the beats mellow for this song. The strings became a bit more complex as I layered two cellos, a viola, and a violin. The flute was just thrown in there to provide a simple melody. Can you tell that the theme here is "keep it simple"? Which is what suggested the title.
"Roundabout" and "Two Sons" were actually composed for Saturn Ascending. But I felt like they didn't fit the more neoclassical theme of the rest of the album, and honestly, they were my two least favorites that I had composed. Don't get me wrong, I think they're both quite good songs. I love the bass riff of "Roundabout" and the piano riffs of "Two Sons." The closing piano of "Two Sons" was actually recycled for "...That Holds Up The Stars" on Saturn Ascending, which is one of my favorite tunes I've ever written. And I felt these songs really needed to be shared. So they were the first and foremost in consideration out of the eleven total for Compromises. They were almost certain to be on it.
I really like the neoclassical and post-industrial elements of "Bare Arms." It began with the piano and subtler beats. The strings were added to provide some grace notes, and the accentuating violin was inspired by my old song "The Nocturnal Dervish." I've been playing around with the lead bass synth for a while now, which I can manipulate to make a sort of buzzsaw sound, inspired by the bass synth in the Tori Amos song "Cruel" on From the Choirgirl Hotel. I'm note quite sure what inspired the rapid keyboard that underlies the segments of layered piano and strings. That was a sort of experiment that I programmed in, which worked surprisingly well, to my delight. The "wah" keyboard that provides some staccato bursts was inspired by the "wah" sound that opens Tool's "Eulogy" from Aenema. So this song is a lot of experimentation, and draws some inspiration from other artists. It also uses some elements that are becoming pretty common in my songs, such as the mechanical sounds of bass synths and clanking percussion. All in all, it comes close to being one of my favorites, and I think would almost be worthy of Saturn Ascending. It's almost certain to be on my next full-length, along with "What the Hell" and "For Simplicity's Sake."
On the Snail Tunes edition of this EP, there's two bonus tracks: "Time Power Gravity Love" and "Grounded and High." "Time Power Gravity Love," of course, is another version of "Power Time Gravity Love," for which I translated the cello melody to piano, and the piano to acoustic guitar (with some modification). "Grounded and High" was something old I took off the shelf, which I thought sounded really good and couldn't believe I hadn't run with. Well, I ran with it this time, finishing it with some piano and electric guitar, and switching up the bass riff a little bit. I had a lot of fun with it, and it came close to taking "The Truth"s' place. It was a tough call. So I just had to include it as a bonus track.
The standard seven-track version of this EP is available at YouTube and YouTube Music, Spotify, Google Play, Apple Music and iTunes, Amazon, Deezer, Pandora, iHeartRadio, Napster, and TIDAL.
As usual, I like to leave you all with a little something special. So here's one of the tracks that didn't make it onto the EP. I tried to come up with a little electronic piano riff that I could recycle, but I think it's a little too bouncy and optimistic. And some of the experimental synths, oddly inspired by Nine Inch Nails, didn't really work for me in the end. But there's some things I really like about it, such as the metal guitars. And some of the techniques and sounds used in this song might pave the way for others. It did come really close to being on the EP or used as one of the bonus tracks. But for now, I think I'll just leave it as a rarity.
I still have in mind to do a review of Lorenzo Masotto's latest album, Frames, and IAMWARFACE put out their debut album (finally!) Year of the Dragon, so there's that too. For now I have to focus on the promotional circus for Compromises. There's tweets to be fired out there, ISRCs to register with SoundExchange, songs to be sent to radio stations and hosts, and the daily link posts and Jukebox posts on my Facebook page. But until the next article, may your inner snails remain resilient and determined.
