Well it’s here, I guess. Not that you should write home about it or anything – I’m not Radiohead; just a prick with a couple of guitars and an iPad. As befits my crippling lack of self-belief, I’m half proud and half appalled by it. Whatever I feel about it though, it will soon be available on your favourite online music store or streaming service and I guess I’m proud of the fact that I’ve made it that far.
I learnt a lot making Up on the Downside (buy your copy today! Home taping is killing music!) and this second album has, not surprisingly, come a lot quicker as a result. Now I know where the knobs are I’ve found it a lot easier to turn something round from a half-strummed idea into a relatively finished product. When I released that album, I was hoping to have this one done by Easter, so I wasn’t even that far out with my guesstimate. In fact, had I not wanted a competent guitarist to play a few solos here and there it’d probably have been done earlier.
Christ this is dull already isn’t it? Soz. The truth is that I’ve talked the individual tracks to death as and then they’ve been completed, so I don’t really want to go over all that old shit again. One thing I will note though, is that this time round there are two instrumental tracks (conveniently obviating the need to write lyrics) and a couple of songs that date back a few years and thus were more about the mechanics of recording than the act of creation.
Nonetheless, even though I’m a flaming shitpile of a person with a sense of self-worth somewhere next to zero, having two albums to my name feels like…. something. I’ve never managed to finish writing a book, or do a decent painting, but this is a thing I’ve actually managed to do in snatched hours here and there, and with little to no formal skill or training.
Next up? Well. I have THREE potential works in the pipeline:
- “Fallen Women” – an EP of half a dozen or so songs I’ve written over the years about tragic women. That’s not a purposeful thing, but it’s occurred to me while I’ve been cataloguing my songs recently. In fact, the first fruit of this endeavour is Florence Rey, which I finished just this weekend.
- A ‘country’ album (I KNOW) – over the years I’ve written a fair few songs at the country/blues/folk end of the pitch and that seem like they might fit together to create a sort of relaxed, easy going album of sorts. I’ve already partially done a few of them, so it seems likely that this will be my next stop on the journey. If you want a sense of what it might sound like, have a listen to this.
- And what I am (no joke) titling “Generic Indie Album” – which is/will be comprised of a number of songs I’ve written that may or may not be any good (depending on your taste) but I’ve always felt to be a bit… well… generic indie. Here‘s a preview of what that will sound like. I’ve even got some suitably generic indie cover art. In a way, you might consider it to be a concept album of sorts.
So that’s my 2018 sorted then.