The Lighthouse Posts

over the coming weeks, i’m going to focus my random posting here to one particular topic, the next record. now with school officially over and grades posted (i got an A by the way) i have turned my attention to writing the next batch of songs for this new record, which is tentatively being called The Lighthouse Project. the name comes from a wonderful short story a dear friend wrote that i actually used in the last record’s liner notes.

i added a category to this blog called “The Lighthouse Posts” to help better distinguish these posts as more and more is written about the process.

it is my intention to document the process from writing, to recording, mixing, mastering and releasing this next record. this one, i think, so far anyway, is special. the last one was really an experiment. it was a test to see if i could actually do it. yeah it was rough around the edges and looking back on it, i wish i had done things differently, but alas, there isn’t anything one can do to change the past, we can only learn from the mistakes and work like crazy to not repeat them in the future.

so why is this next record special?

for a variety of reasons really. first, because sky flying by was actually selected by a pretty decent local recording studio to use a huge chunk of time for free, so i will actually be “heading into the studio” to record this one. i’m not going to be doing that at home. there’s also another local studio, right here in charlestown, that i’ll be using for any remaining overdubbing and mixing. the point being, i’m actually going to have professional support on this one. that, to me, is huge. i understand my limitations, i may know a lot about recording, the process and technology, but i simply lack the practice to turn my music into something i can ultimately be satisfied with. i’m confident that those who will be helping me can achieve a sound and tone i’m really looking for and can’t do on my own.

second, this record is special because it will come out on vinyl. i know i made noises about the last one coming out on vinyl, but because of my ultimate dissatisfaction with how the last one came out, and the expense involved in pressing vinyl, i decided not go ahead with a pressing.

third, the group of songs i’m working on are truly different, i believe. i may (and i stress “may”) have turned a corner in my song writing and figured out how to embrace fluidity. i have a very robotic-like brain, i am always trying to break a problem down into component parts, and fit them together. well that doesn’t always work for song writing. what i’ve done is begun to use the keyboard as a writing device, instead of just relying on the guitar. i think on the keyboard when i find a melody its easier for me to not worry about transitions, and i can just “go with it.” everything else just follows that.

so that’s that. i’ll be spending a couple hours in the studio on monday going over drum kits and the plan is to spend at least a day tracking maybe flowing into a second day in late july, the idea being that each song that will be recorded will be fully scratch-tracked here at home.