I make up a third of a band called FORMAL ACTION. Hopefully the other 2 misguided minstrels will get some shit up on here soon too. We've been doing it for a while (me and OG slee going on four years) But as of late shit has been shaping up. We began recording a full length album last May down here at our home in Narragansett. I finished it up over the course of the summer, and 1000 copies of it are currently being pressed to vinyl in Nashville, TN, a strange and awesome turn of events thanks in huge part to Paul Med, and most of all Rob Duguay, both of whom I have been working with to piece together the humble beginnings of an artistically responsible business dubbed Mooseproof Records.
With the records finally due to arrive in about a week, I thought it would be cool to share where it came from and where it's headed...
The 7 songs on it are the culmination of about 2 years of thoughts, feelings, loves, hates, joys, and struggles shot from 3 individual minds. Fragmented through the mesh-like filters that are our bodies, instruments, and electric currents they reached the atmosphere as a massive moving cloud of soft and warm thought-fuzz, where instantaneously, these infinite parts became a whole. The once separate and intangible, in that same instant become a single unified force, every bit as tangible and alive with its own unique energy as is a caterpillar or a gull. Or the earth itself.
(In other words we set up our instruments around the house with a bunch of microphones and played the songs.) Live. Some of them for the first time in the form you hear them. Since where we lived over the year that bred much of the music had such a profound effect on it, we liked the idea of capturing the vibe of our home (just like it sounded at 4am on new years) on the album. It's interesting to keep in mind when listening to it that the surrounding space plays as big a role as the notes themselves.
After a couple of days of this, we had all the material we needed. We all moved back home for the summer, and I got right into recording guitar overdubs on all of the songs in my parents' basement in Pawtucket. Then I recorded all the vocals at the home of my lovely girlfriend Brittany, and my (slightly less lovely, but incredible) younger brother Mike (Tapestries, Milo). If you listen carefully you can hear him sing backups on a couple of tracks along with his amazing bandmate and friend, Robin. At this point it's also necessary to graciously thank Brittany for making this entire thing possible by letting me use her (equally lovely) mac to do all the postproduction work while my pc lie in bed in a puddle of its own diarrhea.
Once all the tracking was done, I devised a ridiculously complex system which allowed me do the vast majority of the processing using outboard analog effects (spaaaace echo echo echo). So, I went through each track and individually re-recorded them through the outboard fx. I tweaked and finalized the mix, came up with about 19 different masters, and finally settled on one, which I desparately hoped would survive the leap to vinyl intact. It did, and it sounds great. During this time, our good friend Joe Gendron whipped up the awesome jacket art. Major props to him. It looks awesome and I can't wait to finally see 1000 of them in print. It was painted on a 12x24" canvas using spray cans, acrylic, and paint pens.
peep it. (The back is far more ridiculous, but i don't feel like getting it up here)
They will cost only $10 and include a 12" vinyl record AND a free download of the entire album on high quality MP3 ("but I don't have a turntable"). They will be available directly through us, at our shows, on our myspace, and at select Newbury comics locations.
We all are really satisfied with the finished product and feel it is truly a representation of our lives. That's how it earned the name "Life on the Rocks". Its a reference to the human role we play as part of the greater moss on the rocks in this pond of a planet, the struggle we all know that life to be, and literally our life on the rocks overlooking narragansett bay. All of which is captured in these 7 jams. We've got big plans for the future including a 25 city coast to coast tour this july. what.
You can listen to some songs off the album on our
MYSPACE.
And since this post is already ridculously long, I'll refrain from posting all the lyrics to the album, but if you like, you can read them right here.
If you actually made it this far, thanks for reading all that. Let me know what you think.
This is not real.
but when you see it come around again...
you know what to do ;)
peace and love
MD.
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2 comments:
Yea JoJo, that shits fuckin off the hook.
Made it through the novel, good stuff man. Interesting to hear the path of the album laid our like that, all the people involved and all of that good community stuff. Keep up the good work.
1
K-Thack
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