Lots of work + release date

Instead of relaxing this past weekend and before weekend I was working with M4D release pretty much all guns blazing so to speak. First thing that was under work already before weekend really, was listening and feeling if there's something more to be added. There was not. So, ... I found myself heading into mastering process. And that was the "lots of work" thing that took most of weekend. Even that I'm nothing sort of perfectionist, I noticed some flaws that needed finetuning even to my lofi ears - and after fixing sessions happened, I was of course bouncing new master for listening ... then listening 1-2 times the whole package through, and then back to fixing again as / if needed. Etc.

The master number 5 was the version that became the very final version.

I listened that final package several times and felt satisfied. Nothing to be fixed, and I abandoned the thought I had at some point, for adding some crazy vocals here and there - there is only one place with such thing going on, and there reason for that, too. The overall vibe benefits from the certain kind of monotonic vocal style going on for the most of the time.

So, ... the package just went to CDbaby and I've set the release date as 26th of May 2026. As there is full month to that date, I'm sure there will be no delays and the release will be verified more than in time for release date by CDbaby. Meaning that it should appear into all known and less known streaming medias exactly on that date. I'll write later (quite probably only after release) about why I chose exactly that date, and later also what going on about these tunes ... at some point.

I've still got some stuff to go through, even that I have front cover artwork and back cover artwork all done. I'm going to craft a graphic lyrics package (as pdf file) that I can throw as bonus into sites like bandcamp for example. Not just that, but I've also had idea for several weeks already; that instead of stopping the work here with this new album, I'm going to make an instrumental edit of it and later release it as separate thing. Not right away, possible like end of the Summer 2026 or something.

I'll return here to reveal more about the forthcoming album in coming days / weeks. Track titles, final lengths, overall length of album, album title and of course the cover artwork too.

Teaser!

Teaser for the album is online at Youtube! Check it out <here> or right below. 

Teaser/trailer under works

As I had pre'planned and worked some visual materials in advance (already in early March or so) it wasn't big task to really get working with crafting a teaser/trailer for this forthcoming album. I mainly had one problem, and in the end I guess it's a positive problem ...

... the trailer isn't your typical 20-30 seconds or something shorts style of clip. It's doom metal all right? Or should I say dooooooooom metal? Can you guess what it means already? Well, my problem was that I had way too many moments to choose from, I mean moments that I feel depict this package in a great way - choosing the moments was kind of hard, but I did choose them all. One clip from each song, and there's certain logic in the clips. Some of the clips are shorter, but the ending clip is longer. All in all, even that I tried to make it "tight" it's ... 4 minutes long video, currently.

The video is still under works, but it's pretty far already and I don't think I'll go adding much more effects and fancy stuff to it. This is going to be quite a stripped down album musically, at least I personally feel so ... so the teaser/trailer kind of depicts it, too.

Oh, and the visual in the forthcoming teaser/trailer are animations based on front cover art.

PS: The trailer might be ready sooner than I (or you) think. 

Final vocals recorded + plans for a teaser/trailer

Yesterday I recorded the final vocals for the opening track, the so-called main title song - and a very personal one at that. I recorded the vocals exactly as I visioned, after certain tragic event had just happened and the vibes went straight to vocals. Came out great, very much in a way I thought it would, in the end. Literally in the end. 

Now I'll listen to all the tracks and see how the overall flow and vibe goes. I do think there is some small finetuning to be done, but nothing major. As I was listening to the opening track with vocals, I already felt there might be need for some extra space sound elements, gotta look more into it.

It looks like the overall lenght might go around 49 minutes - with two songs being just 3-4 minutes long, one song under 6 minutes long and the rest three tunes are rather massive 10+ minutes long pieces. 

I think I am aiming for late May release, a certain date which coincides with the main title song directly.

PS: I am also planning for crafting a little trailer at this stage, it's not a problem if the songs aren't in 100% final shape (they are getting very close to that anyway). Perhaps within a week? In best possible case within days. So that it would appear into Youtube about a month before release date.

PPS: I have also idea for making an instrumental edition of this album later. If it happens, it will be separate release.

More vocals recorded

I recorded vocals for the closing song, song # 6, tonight. Came out really fitting, and the end result is something that I more than accept. And as I didn't "finetune" the lyrics for this closing song earlier as much as other songs' lyrics, there were some notable changes while recording the vocals - even that some changes came, the vocals were recorded mostly on 1st take. Some took two takes. And I have to say that the changes I made to the lyrics were like ... it felt like it was meant to go this way, 100% certainly. Because of the changes the album closes lyrically so that it connects with the main title song (opening song) ... which is more than fitting considering the theme of it all.

Gotta see if I have time to continue working on this during weekend. It could be that I relax and continue only after weekend as I'm in no rush with this. Ever since I started crafting this album I felt strongly that I know what the release date will be. And I'm more certain of it now, it connects with the main title song and the connection with real life events. 

Enjoy thy weekend!

Progression?

It's been row of days since I last wrote about how things are going. Or has it been, really? Huh ... just checked, can't really say row of days ... well it makes this post even more descriptive for the situation. Does the bit (one day or bit more?) longer silence mean nothing has happened in the meanwhile? Nope. It means actually the exact opposite!

To say a lot has happened since last writing is not exaggeration at all.

It almost feels like I don't even remember all that I've done for this new material since I last wrote as I tend to work in trance'like state with music projects I do. But yeah ... instead of going to work on 6th song's lyrics as I thought I would, I went into recording vocals. For the other songs which have lyrics ready and pre'arranged, too. I thought I'd just try how it feels and goes but instead of just trying, well, the vibes were so good that I was soon recording the "real" vocals instead of just some tests. Layered vocals; currently there are 3 channels for vocals, kind of low growling, very high bit robotic kind of vocals and then quite normal / cleanish vocal channel. And it might be that I'll do some extra layer (4th channel) for some sections. 

As you might guess already from that, I've got quite a lot of vocals recorded. Yeah. I started with track 3 which went great, fully completed and I liked how it sounded - so I went ahead. Next was track 5 and the same results as with track 3 ... so ahead I went. Next into track 2 and the same strong vibes continued there. Tonight I went into track 4 which is one of the long tunes and I got it completed, too. So I have vocals pretty much recorded for four tunes out of six tunes (!) and not much lyrics have been changed / finetuned in the process, either. Pre'arrangements have worked fine.

I have two long tunes left and I already know the order how it will go ... next up will be the 6th tune (I already worked for its' lyrics today, they should be pretty much ready for recording too, now) and the last one will be the 1st tune. The song I call "the main title song" or key song of this pack ... and there is a heavy, deep reason why it will be the last. I will write about that later, as the release is all ready and has been out there for some time.

It feels really crazy how fast this release has progressed. Talk about outlet for personal life, which this release this time truly is. There's been that element in past releases at times, but never in this scale, for sure. It's been just one tune here on one tune there. Now ... well I'll write about this later, like said. But I can say it's stuff that makes heavy doom album feel even more heavy. That's how it feels for me anyway.

More lyrics and some thoughts

 I took a well deserved rest from all of this last weekend, but then went straight back into writing lyrics. I finetuned some parts for tunes 3 and 4, got them pretty much sorted out / ready from lyrics and arrangements' point of view, I think. 

Also wrote base of lyrics for 5th song, and got demo vocal arrangements done for it quite nicely. And late yesterday evening I wrote chunk of text as base for lyrics for the closing song, tune # 6. That one needs a lot of more work still, when it comes to lyrics and of course arranging the vocals. And some decisions as well; it's either extremely slow vocals or rather fast ones - or it could be mixture of both. But we'll see, gotta work on those lyrics way more and then it gets easier to decide.

But progression goes like it has gone past weeks; really good and feels really good to work on this. I think this is turning into quite an exciting package in many ways. It is definitely continuation for previous album, but it's also something more than just that.