Were Making Music Now

Still not making as much progress as I would like on the new album.  I need to just get on with it. 

As promised last time, I will go over the albums this time, well to be more precise, the first album this time (We’re Making Music Now).  I started to write this, and it ended up being longer than I thought.  So, to keep this entry from getting too long I will limit it to the first album.  I might group them or keep them separate in future updates. 

This album causes the most debate amongst the group.  It does not follow the story.  In fact it could not, as we worked on it between the events of Interstellar Sounds and Invasion Earth (we were trying to learn our craft).  After we completed this album, we went back and started to tell the story.  The whole reason this album came about was a suggestion from the Fencing Marlins front man.  We were discussing our progress and he pointed out that at some point, I need to put something together and make an album.  Without that plan, I would just go and make musical snippets forever and we would never get going.  I tended to agree (as did the rest of the band), historically it is easy to prep forever and never take the leap (and we would learn something as we get ready for our more serious music).

So, leap we did.  We took all those snippets, loaded them back onto Topper (original OP-1) and made sorta songs out of them.  Some of them came out ok, others not so much.  It is interesting they were all original ideas (try to learn to do something specific) so the process was not as easy as it might sound.  At least until we were playing around with what came to be the title track (Making Music) and I just heard the music and started singing (originally it has no words, but those words just came out).  After that, it seemed to get easy, something just clicked. 

Even though it seemed to click, this really was the learning process, not a designed album.  I struggled with Topper (understanding how to lay down tracks without getting those pops etc).  The spacecraft had limited control of their synthesizers.  We did not understand how to mix/balance.  We also did not have a good plan to bring it all together (watch the early video showing me demonstrating this).  When I listen to this one, I can hear all the errors that were made.  We weren’t really making music but trying to define our process to make music for the future (and basically a practice album came out of that).

DarkStar just hates this album.  When he hears it, it sounds like there was no plan (as stated above, there wasn’t except learn to do things).  Not just does it not really have any plan in and of itself, it does not really fit into our album continuity.  Though all of this is true, Flash likes it and I get the feeling Super has some guilty pleasures.  This album generates a lot of debate within our group.  It is true it is not part of the story, but after the next album, we will be getting away from the story a bit anyway (and go with some experiences).  So, is it important that it be in the story continuity?

DarkStar wants this gone as why would you publish what is not your best effort.  Super wants to keep it (somewhat but not strongly) as it is a part of our history.  To get to know us, it is good to get the story from the beginning (even the struggles show growth as musicians).  Flash just thinks it was one of the more enjoyable albums to make.  There was no plan, no structure, we were just having fun putting together some tunes.  My tendency has been to vote to keep it.  Both Phasing Through Time and Space and Traveling Through Hard and Soft Borders tend to get a bit of play and why take that away from anyone.

As I said, the songs were all targeted at other things.  The titles tend to give it away.  For example, Space Is Big but a Chance Flyby was one satellite alone in his slot, when another comes drifting through (basically enters on one side and leaves after the friendly hello).  Both Phasing… and Traveling… were about making music through boundaries of change (how accomplished was a bit different). 

The first of the two outliers was Space Funk Live V1.  This came about as we did not know what type of music we wanted to do.  We decided to basically come up with a backing track for different types of music, and then just solo (recorded live).  This would allow us some exposure.  Originally, we were going to do a different genre on each album (we did get to Pop and Rock).  However, we figured it out, so we stopped this (they really did not fit the story well anyhow after the two mentioned).

The second outlier was Making Music.  That appears 4 times on the album.  Once with no words (as was originally planned.  The goal to that was to make a non-gimmick song (so the point of the song was to have no point).  We were going to call it making music.  The words just came to me (were making music now, its coming through somehow, on this little keyboard….) and I was singing along.  We decided to split it to a start, mid and end, and of course used it with no words. 

That was enough on the first (very controversial) album.  I hope you liked it (even with all the short comings.