Image info: A walk in the woods near Remrod... the origin on the Black Bee or so I've heard.
Good morning, it’s Monday. Here in Bok the flowers come early along the coastline… and with that.. wild-life seems to be coming back as well. The willows on the hillside are still a month away from glory but it’s inevitable you know, change, growth.. the cycle. A lot is going on in the Hadder world, here’s a little update.. including a few more serious things regarding the smoke I see on the horizon and the war beyond these lands.
New Music: It was a very productive and busy weekend of tracking, 2 days on “Long is the Road”, the final track for the Hadder record, and then the 1st long vocal session on “Rainbow in the Dark”. I have some new mixes I’m dancing with this week.. a slow waltz...I’m playing a lot of guitar as I turn the bend on “Long is the Road” and begin recording solos this week.. I like to give my fingers a few days of tempo scales and key patterns to warm the digets before I start tracking such things… but so far so good. I’m made some progress already, just a day or two of tracking more and it should be complete on the solo front. Then it will enter some production days where I’ll start thinking about the arrangement of the song as a whole and refine it a bit, stepping aside from the individual instruments and parts and focusing on the string that runs through the song, start to finish. That’s the process. Very cool track, can’t wait to share it. The latest Evermore/Ramsay track called “Kind Winters” is on a kind Holiday, as I shift a little to get back to completing the record in my new tower and this last big push to complete it. The evermore/ramsay material is something that is just pleasantly happening along side the Hadder record. I'll return to kind winters some day this month and finish it up, not much left on that. Like I said, very busy week of tracking… I’ll be listening to all that work the next few days and steering the ship based on what I hear. I’ll try to share some audio and video things later in the week as some of the mixes have sections that are cool enough for a little 45 second video or two.
Website: So, yes, you may have noticed the news section when through a little Update visually. I’ve been wanting to do this for months and so last Friday, I finally sat with the idea and redesigned the layout. I just thought the old BLOG look was pretty lame looking and I wanted something a bit more animated and exciting looking. I designed a new video player and stretched out the canvas a bit allowing video and moving animations on the “Mobil” app as well… so the experience of it is quite simply, more “Fun” to look at. I mean what he hell else am I doing this all for, this is supposed to be fun and creative. The website is an extension of what I’m creating, it’s almost as important as the record to me, or at the very least another part of the big picture… yet to be completed but inching towards a more finished product. The record and the website feed the tour and the PR once I release the record. It all needs to come together around the same time. Next on the website will be the music page, which in time will get a more exciting look with each track having lyrics, audio, video and visuals to go along with them. I also have the “Field Notes” audio clips that are on my list, and just need some time to record them. I’m guessing that will be a little while as it’s just not high on my priority list. “Field Notes” are the ever-growing dialog and story of the Hadder Novel, which might become a play or opera or 2nd record. So there’s no hurry on it, I answer the call as the story unfolds during my hillside walks and nightly trips to dream land.
The War: I thought I would mention today, my grandfather was Ukrainian. I grew up eating a lot of polish and Ukrainian food but after him and my grandmother passed, my Ukrainian heritage seemed to vanish along with them. Always a mystery to me. I dreamed of going there one day to walk the earth in the hope I could connect some dots in my own life. It was on my list of things to do. I’ve been a little glued to the box lately watching the war playout on the distant hillside. To be honest I didn’t know much about the place… but wow, what an amazing people, I’m so honored to call myself part Ukrainian. Perhaps I know now where I get some of my fight from. Praying for them all.
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PS One last thing, I woke the other morning with two words floating in my head, “Todd Quist”, I have absolutely no idea why those words were dancing in my mind… but I reached for paper instantly and wrote them down. I don’t know what they mean yet.,.. but I know they mean something. I’m listening.
-j