Lyrics, artwork and stuff

 It's been several weeks since I last wrote. A lot has happened in the meanwhile, the biggest thing being that all the songs now have final lyrics & vocal arrangements roughly done. There is clearly a larger tale which forms from the tales off all the songs in the album. This became even more evident as I got the rest lyrics done. It is all connected to the album title - as said previously; smaller scale sounding cosmic title this time around, but the grand tale which forms from the individual songs is on a different level with its' scale. Small pictures (songs) form a much bigger picture of a cosmic kind. 

I also got the album artwork (front & back cover art) completed recently. Front cover depicts the certain aspect of the whole tale(s) directly, in a doomy way. Feels very fitting and good, the visual side, to me personally.

The biggest work remaining to be done is of course recording the vocals. I'm not sure whether I'll record them at my current home or at new place. Also sampling aspect & possible keyboard work remains to be done, too. Depending where (and especially when) I'll record the vocals, the release date happens in late 2020 or in early 2021. Time shall tell, as usual.

... more lyrics, and some thoughts.

 It's been really hectic past few weeks, haven't had much time to really work with the lyrics. Still the work has progressed as currently I have lyrics fully completed (and arranged) for 4 songs so since last post one song has been given a name and content. 

Not just that, but the rest 3 songs have titles ready, too. Just need to write the lyrics. I realized recently that the 7 songs will form a kind of large scale tale from beginning to end. It is definitely scifi, not all the way such gigantic scale stuff than in past, but ... there's a certain theme to it all. It connects with life on earth (and beyond) so to speak, so it's partially fact based, but it's also heavily fiction based. It's different kind of lyrics than in past, I'd say. It will make an interesting album to say the least.

Also it remains to be seen whether I'll get this release ready in 2020 or will it go into 2021. Otherwise I'd strongly predict it's ready in 2020, but it looks like we are going to move in late 2020 and it means I'm going to get a recording space of my own, a dream I've had for years! To be able to record the additional elements (like vocals) in private space - instead of living room - feels quite tempting. We'll see what happens. In any case I can say this is going to be a nasty scifi doom album, in many ways ...

More lyrics ...

Got some nice work done today; 2 songs got lyrics completed and also pretty much arranged as well. Going to work through all the songs this way, first writing around the music and then doing the arrangements. Working like this makes it much easier for recording the actual vocals some day, whenever that is going to happen ... or where. It might happen here where I currently live, or somewhere else. We'll see ...

Anyway, I like how the lyrics go, even that I know it will not be necessarily easy for me to sing them all through, being a native finnish speaking person. Well, there's always room for some challenges. Gotta practice the stuff before recording sessions - and like said, I don't know yet when it might happen (or where, exactly).

Four more songs need lyrics to be written. That's where I'm heading next in coming week as time permits.

After the summer break

 Well, I did take a summer break as I thought I would, yeah. I've progressed with the album in the meanwhile, during this August mainly. I've got the artwork somewhat done, but some work remains there. To be continued later.

When it comes to the actual music, I started writing lyrics during the summer as ideas started flowing and it seems that there might be a certain theme to the songs. Doomy theme, of course, but not in such a grand scale as in previous albums, necessarily. Should I call it as planetary downshifting in a brutal way? ;)

Anyway, one song has 100 % lyrics completed and I've also arranged the vocals (not recorded anything yet, though). Two other songs have core lyrics / verses prepared, but nothing arranged. And that's where I am currently. Recently I haven't had any time to continue the work, because of multiple things happening.

In any case the work continues. I'm not sure if I can get the release ready in 2020 as some big (positive) life changes are taking place during next few months quite likely. But I'll be working on the album whenever I can and am in a fitting mood for it.

Bassworks vol 3

Got all the bassguitars recorded for now. Really happy with the results.

I'm still not sure whether I'd record the separate outro song or not, actually I've got two ideas for that song - the original idea (which has a strong tie to other tracks on the album) and the new idea (which has in a way hardly anything to do with the other tracks on the album, a weird possibly acoustic one). Might well be, that I won't do that outro song at all, because the current 7th song (which I feel will be the last song if there is no outro song) works so well as The End. Might feel even more like that after I get the ideas for space / dark ambient elements crafted to that ending section. Gotta see how it goes.

Now I will have a short break from the material. Let it be a bit, take a little summer break (even if my holiday starts only after some weeks from now on) and then go back working on it with fresh ears. 

That does not mean nothing is happening. Visual work has already started, I've started planning and working with creating the front and back cover artwork for the album. That's might well work as the "short break from material" since I'm not working with the music. ;)  

Bassworks vol.2

During past few days I've continued the journey with basslines. Several songs have now pretty much final bassguitars recorded and it sounds sweet to me (definition of "sweet" might differ here according to whom you might ask, for example my wife wouldn't call the bass sound so sweet necessarily) ... :)

While I've been busy recording the basslines, some songs have got slight structural changes while at it. Nothing too major though, some longer intro section here and stuff like that there. While I've recorded bass, I've occasionally recorded unconventional basslines on the fly without trying first how it fits. Which is quite freaky since I don't consider myself as much bass player, more like basic jammer. After recording with pure intuition / feeling, I've listened the results with curiosity. Most the time these intuitional bassguitar moments have been saved because they work so well, which makes me just glad. Some twisted sections here and there, in some cases with one take only. Also, some guitar riffs sound seemingly simple, yet in reality they are such cases that I've had to be more creative with bass here and there. Not all the time, there are lots of straightforward true doom metal playing for sure. 

Also worth mentioning is, that while I've been recording the basslines, I've started to get ideas for song titles and at times also lyrics and they connect with the album title I've had in mind for some weeks already. The song titles so far feel inspiring and here's a good example from earlier today: I was listening to one of the new songs and "feeling" the song title idea I earlier had for just this song. Suddenly some lyrics started coming to me, connecting to the song title and what a great feeling as while listening to the heavy (what I think is) chorus section, I mentally tried arranging the lyrics there and they felt like they fitted in perfectly! Talk about intuitive process.

Well, for now I still have some bassguitars to be recorded, so the work continues. Great mood ... for doom! \m/

Massive drumworks & Beginning of da basslines

Phew. I thougt I was going to go ahead with composing the possible outro song as I stated in previous post, but ... what happened, was once again intuitive process. I haven't yet done anything about possible outro song but instead I went through all the drums for the seven songs so far. Made lots of fills and did some beat tuning and stuff. Also major sound tuning for the drums. Such a big amount of work that actually I'm quite sure I have all the work done for drums! And I have to say that the drums raised into whole new level if compared to what they were (demo beats, no variation at all, zero fills etc). I'm really satisfied with the drumworks for now and they could well be in their final form now, as stated.

Not just that, but today I took and started bass guitar experiments. Got the bassguitar sound surprisingly near what I visioned for the sound to be this time ... not so clean and kind of soft as it was on "cosmic time foundation" release, but more dirty and for the lack of better word, noisy. And I got the sound initially crafted, brief test session followed ... then I went and recorded bass for the first song in the pack. The result makes me grin, it sounds even better than what I expected. Works very nicely with the guitarsound, too (oh yeah, I adjusted the guitarsound lately, too). Going to be sweet to record the basslines with this sound & style (deliberately chose to play with fingers, not using pick at all) for all the rest songs. 

And also an interesting note which was born in the drum sessions: The last new song currently (number 7) has quite a different ending, it got adjusted more as I thought previously ... and it starts to feel that it could  work nicely as a long song which turns into outro in the end. If that happens, then I would not use my idea for 8th separate outro song. Gotta see and feel how it goes. 

Pic from today's bass session below with a fittingly themed face, too.

Seventh signal (and some drumworks)

So, I got the next song base worked out pretty far. Not necessarily 100 % ready, still have to feel the ending of the song (which is different to the other tunes). Anyway, coincidental or not but this song with working number seven happens to be about 7 minutes long. Interesting one, having two radically different moods. Other one is almost "happy" while the other one is broodingly dark, heavy and extra doomy. Quite a mix of opposites in one song! But it works really well and once again I really dig the way it goes.

Not just this song number seven, but I also worked with drums - sound tweaking and stuff, and I made some awesome progress at that department too. Actually I have idea for outro style song which would end the album, song number eight. That will be next in line. After that's done, then I gotta look into bass guitar sessions, I guess.

Anyway, what is the mood (for doom) at this current stage? Well just today I crafted a pic that quite nicely describes how I feel as creator of this stuff. How the music makes me feel. Check it out below. 

6 ... 6 ...

Sixth song base just got done. Funnily as it got finished I noticed it happens to be (in its' current form) exactly 6 minutes long. Working title number 6, song length 6 (minutes). Hmmm. :)

Anyway, really digging this song base, too ... kind of a weird case, hard to put it into words, but clearly continues in the same style than the rest of the pack. Good flow, even groovy at times. 

I still have presaved riffs/melodies for one more new song. Then it might be that I'll compose one extra song out of current moment and feelings - so the final number of tracks will be either 7 or 8. We'll see how it goes.

I also got idea for both the album title and front cover artwork. It came ouf of blue to me yesterday, and it might well be that I follow the intuition with this, too, once again.

Next one

So, ... I started crafting the next tune few days ago and did this 5th one in multiple sessions. It's clearly a different piece if compared to previous newbies. It's also slower. Hypnotic, sleeping stream song. And different also when it comes to riffs, not so much traditional riffing but sort of experimental in some ways. I have a feeling this song will expand notably when it's time for recording bass guitars.

At its' current stage this song is also the longest one so far, around 7 minutes or so. 

Them composing & demoing sessions shall continue. More is still to come.

The 4th one

As I had free from work today, I had time to arrange & expand the fourth new song base. Funnily the song length at this stage begins with ... 5, again. Well, if these songs will be all around that length, so be it. It's not the length that matters, even if I myself keep mentioning it in these posts. It's just funny thing to take note since in past M4D songs have usually been notably longer.

Well, the length of song bases is not the only thing that makes me wonder. Today I knew I'd be working a "faster" song so to speak. Not exactly fast, but not Reverend Bizarre kind of dragging true doom style either. And here's another nice observation since I don't force the songs but I let them form in the way they feel the best for me: The song that was supposed to be "fast case" is not so fast, but instead it drags in hypnotic way, mid'tempo beats.

And like with the other new song bases, I really like this one too - already at this rough crafting stage.

Just noticed that I have still three melodies / riffs I've saved in past few years to be used. One of them is something that I don't know if I'll use it or not. It's quite a weird riff and tricky to play, too. Well, we'll see what happens. At least 2 more songs will form from the riff archive, that's certain.

Third gait sang

Third new song base got crafted today. Continuation clearly, at the same time in a way also different one - and it happens to be the slowest song of the pack so far (80 BPM currently, in case you wanted to know). Funnily it still seems to be around the same length than first two song bases, nod longer but still about the same length. Well, if that's the way it goes, then so be it.

Very good vibes anyway, again. Heavy stuff.

Towards the newbies

Today I crafted second new song based on the melodies I've saved during past 2 years or so. If I got good vibes from the first rusty demo session, this one feels instantly awesome to me. It reeks the certain kind of desperate & sad mood combined with heavy doom metal stuff. And the mood does not stay the same and has some hidden connections to ... well, better not reveal it all. Anyway, it sounds and feels great to me at this very early stage, containing nothing else base drums and rhytm guitars.

I haven't set any certain length for the songs, but I'll let them form as they come - so far it's not monstrous songs but around 5 minutes long songs. Interesting to see if it continues this way or not.

Time

Look, yet again about 1 year has passed since my last writing. Yes, I'm still here. What happened during the last year? Few more melodies were saved for later composing stage. And guess what? Suddenly just yesterday was the time: I took my guitar and went into composing / structuring stage for first new song. Crafted the basic drumtrack yesterday and recorded the basic riffs today. Not final guitar tracks but like a rehearsal / composing demo for myself. Nice flow, about 5 minutes long midtempo song.

Well, anyway ... I have no schedule, I'm going to continue this process of composing & rehearsal demoing as I see fit / feels good. Currently it looks like I will surely continue and not stop with this first experiment. Album might form during this 2020, or then not. At least there's suddenly lots of time as there's this certain 'coronation of our domain' (Malevolent Creation reference for ya) going around the globe.