Video

I got to make a video last week with Lenny Epstein, one of Kingston's finest videographers.
I should have made something really high concept and cool that would be eye poppingly unique and grasp the attention of the internet with an iron fist.
But instead, I decided to make something that I would like, that I pictured when I heard the song.
The song is 'Can't Know' (track 11 on the line) and it is all set on a river. Said river goes from the lake near North Bay that my family has been cottaging on since the fifties to a string of other lakes that are all on untouched crown land. I soloed up the river in a canoe, with Lenny and the camera in another canoe. Cameras in canoes is a terrifying prospect but we managed to get everything we needed without serious incident. There are many slightly wobbly, gliding shots.

It has been ten thousand years since I've updated this neglected corner of the internet. In the intervening years many things have happened. The album came out and it was shockingly well received. Thanks world. I got to go on tour with one of my personal musical heroes - Timber Timbre. That was wonderful. We had a big CD release in Toronto. I went home to my parents place and we cut up deadfall to make about 20 life size trees, which we then scattered around the Tranzac. We found a homemade bird and suspended it above the stage. I recorded crickets, coyotes, birds, and wind, and played the sounds on mp3 players I hid around the room. We got two stages going. On one, Lisa Bozikovic and Snowblink did their gorgeous thing, and on the main stage we had Weird Weather and Muskox featuring Isla Craig.
What else has happened? We got to play Apple Crisp in Kingston, and it somehow managed to be one of my favourite shows ever. We played the fantastic Gordon Best Theatre in Peterborough. We played a horrible show in Ottawa. Alone, and fighting a bad cold, I travelled east with Timber Timbre, playing Sherbrooke to a shockingly fantastic crowd, Sackville, lovely as always, Halifax twice, and PEI twice.
I couldn't have imagined a better spring.

DAW

A fellow named Jordan asked what my recording setup was.
Jordan, this is for you.

I have a fairly exhausted, slightly senile Toshiba laptop. I have a 2 channel beginner M-Audio box. I must upgrade it. My DAW is Sonar Producer 4. This is a PC only program that doesn't get alot of attention, but I like it an awful lot. Very good reverb and EQ plug-ins built in. My secret weapon is my AKG C3000B that I bought used from the fellows at Long and McQuade. Thanks fellows. The entire record was recorded with its warm loveliness, except for the moment when I broke out the Shure SM78 to record Dwight's drums. I own a cheap pair of AKG headphones, and broken computer speakers that will soon be replaced. When I mix, I rent expensive beasts from Long and McQuade. For information, I turn to the internet. I ask lots of stupid questions on message boards.

I have never used MIDI.

I have one stand and one cable. I have an old piano my parent's got from the Shelburne Junior School before they closed it down back in the 70's. I have three banjos - my beginner Goodtime, a heavy, frighteningly shiny Sierra, and a fretless, nylon stringed fellow from, well, sometime before 1900. I have my grandfather's centenarian classical guitar, a big steel string I can't play, a broken 12 string, a broken lap steel with some out of control wolf tones, and a 60's Harmony Mars electric guitar with a bowed neck. Actually, I now have two Harmony Mars's, but I will likely sell one. Or start a band where everybody plays matching guitars. I have a wheezy 25 dollar button box accordion, an out of tune court organ and a Hohner Melodica my friend Dave gave me. This is on top of my childhood collection of plastic castanets, steel drums, and one mallet glocs.

I own a fabulous collection of steel bowls and some great mason jars. I own a snippy pair of scissors, and a two violin bows. I have pots, and also pans, and crinkly wrapping paper. I will generally have wine and beer bottles around, and someday will make a beer bottle pan flute. I have wooden blocks, sticks, pens, pencils, and good boots for stomping.

My recording setup is placed gingerly on a desk, generally festooned with bills, envelopes, and loose change. It faces a small window in an entirely red room that is not soundproofed. At all. I hang colourful quilts for sound treatment and hope for the best.

April 28th is the date.
We will be releasing our first full length, The Line, into the world with the help of Fontana North.

The Line is 12 tracks long. Four of those tracks were seen in some form on 'East'.

The Line is the culmination of four years of slow and patient work, teaching myself to record and write music in order to say something specific about loss. I'm not sure if I said it, but I think I said something.

Our official CD release will be April 30th, in the Tranzac's Main Hall. Muskox & Isla Craig will play, Snowblink too, and Weird Weather of Peterborough, who are also releasing a disc. A secret team of people will be transforming the Tranzac into a forest like space. More on that later.

Death Valley

I have meteorological dreams.
Last night I dreamed about Death Valley, one of the most visceral places I've been. To stand at the bottom of Death Valley is to stand on the surface of the moon. You can see for miles. It is bigger and stranger and darker than you can understand.
One of the first things that struck me about Death Valley was the sound. If you sit in the middle of the desert, in silence, your head feels stuffed with cotton wool. The silence doesn't sound like silence. Sound travels strangely and deceivingly - a voice on your left sounds like its coming from your right. The ground sounds hollow when struck. The only thing I can attribute it to is that Death Valley is one of the hottest, driest places on Earth. Perhaps the lack of moisture in the air means that the sound is hampered or modified in its travels.
Which is why I was surprised by my dream last night.
I dreamed about Death Valley in terms of moisture, dampness. The salt flats were flooded and the mountains were hemmed in with oppressive cloud. Everything was drenched in slow, heavy rain. I was sweating.
It is raining in Death Valley right now. This doesn't happen very often.

Also, there's this:
http://www.anomalies-unlimited.com/OddPics/Playa.html

Also, there's this.

Photographs.
Taken by Meredith Cheesbrough at The Tranzac.