It’s been a little while since my last post, sorry mum and dad… *
It’s not like I haven’t wanted to keep you up to date. It isn’t because I have had nothing to report. It’s actually because I have been super busy ticking off (and adding more to) the list of things I set out to achieve as part of this little adventure!
Craig reminded me that it was (or is soon to be?) queens birthday weekend back in Oz, and that it has been a year since our place got robbed. That robbery could aptly be described as the straw that broke the camels back and convinced me I was due for a change of circumstances. I don’t remember just how much I mentioned it to you at the time (less sure about the rest of you reading here), but I was pretty pissed off with my job, and felt in a bit of a rut as far as friendships, relationships etc. Canberra all of a sudden felt a little bit claustrophobic.
Not wanting to sound too precious, all was rolling along fine I guess, but after 4 years in the one job, constantly fighting to justify my existence, with more and more friends moving out of Canberra, and with me and the rest of my circle going about our groundhog-day like routine, smaller and smaller things started getting me down.
You know I’m generally a happy guy, but I was noticing myself getting pissed off and/or a little depressed from time to time, and being pissed off and depressed is something that pisses me off and depresses me (!).
I had a few things that kept me happy and grounded. One was spending the best part of last year hanging out with/getting to know/and living with Craig. He is pretty much the only person I know (in the real, non internet message-board based world) with more or less the same left field musical tastes as me, with a shared interest in abstract and underground/alternative hip-hop. Another was spending countless hours emailing/joking/scheming and musically collaborating with Ryan and Ben from across the globe. We used the internet to form a band, discuss music, write and share lyrics and instrumentation and even coordinate a virtual recording weekend with hopes of putting together a demo/EP. A weekend was settled on where Ryan went to Ben’s in Amsterdam, recorded vocals over some MP3’s of my beats that I sent him, and they emailed them back to me to mix down into the original tracks…
Those vocal tracks were delivered to my inbox at pretty much the exact same time as my computer was dragged from my house through a pile of wreckage that included the 5 or so remaining CD's from my 200 or so strong collection of fairly specific and in parts very rare music, a few left over cables that were once connected to my computer, musical gear, Craig’s TV, stereo amp, Gravy’s (later recovered but pretty beat up) turntables, Chilco’s now scratched up records… and also through blood drips and broken glass.
Enter the camel and pile of straw. I spoke to Ryan via phone at about 1am Oz time, after I’d taken stock of what happened, and heard his voice for the first time in about a year since I was on the holiday where I met him. Our conversation basically involved me throwing my hands up and admitting defeat. I had had it with my circumstances and conceded to what I’m now happy to call a mid youth crisis. I decided I was going to try and move overseas. Since that day and that decision things have gotten better and better pretty much every day, and I don’t know if I’ve ever been this happy!
One year on, still no EP, but definitely no less enthusiasm. Still a lot of distractions for all of us, but mostly good healthy music related distractions! The amount of talk between the 3 of us about music, the recording of vocals already done, the working, fine tuning, learning new software, understanding each other’s strengths and developing our sound, and the attendance of gigs, meeting musicians etc has kept things moving at their same slow and steady pace. But I’m pretty sure once we all get together and record in the same room at the same time (something that hasn’t happened yet), magic may just happen, and minds could quite possibly explode… That, or we will all have another of the “best days of our lives” hanging out doing what we enjoy doing.
More updates from across the continent soon (with Pics).
*Dad, you have asked a few times about my musical aspirations, and I have been meaning to fill you in (still am, just haven’t got to it yet), so hopefully this explains a bit more.
Wednesday, June 4, 2008
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4 comments:
Great to hear from you. It was obvious things were going very, very well (likely, I felt) or very badly (unlikely). Plus knew you were travelling a bit, as you'll soon report. Pity, probably, that you inherited your father's tendency to obsessiveness, search for perfection, inclination to manic-depressivity, etc. But also you got the travel bug thrown in for free!
Look forward to hearing more, and will write more myself. The music stuff sounds very promising. Doesn't 6 months - soon - pass in a flash?! Dad
word dude - its only when we get out of comfort zones that we can really grow
that time you got broken into was tough on all of us. i mean, friends of yours told me that your house was owned by some dodgy european (aren't they all?), stocked full of expensive stuff (hardly) and there was easy access (does my blood all over your floor say 'easy access' to you!!??). anyway, it was a crazy mixed up time which we all chuckle about now. and it is good to see some good came out of it.
me? well, after selling your stuff at ridiculously low prices at the civic skate park i am just keeping on keeping on. i got a tip from some massive tattooed red-headed chump that there is a girly curly-haired blonde bloke over in kaleen who is ripe for the pickings. good to catch up buddy.
i thought maybe that the ghastly finger injury would have led to your change of life perspective.
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