...Yeah, so the writing is going good... we were due to test run a new tune at the WSL show, but we were unable to do the show after a personal tragedy for one of us... still, me, Luke and Jimothy managed to get over and give a show of solidarity and respect for WSL and the other bands that played, and then, after, I managed to throw an almighty whitey, which found me sat on the potty in the toilets of our local, pants round mi ankles, white as a sheet, cold turkeying like a bastard...
Anyway...
...I think it's fair to say that it took a while for us to get in the groove, but the last couple of practices have been pretty amazing... rejigged one of the songs we've been playing live and written a fifth tune, which is in the process of being nailed and locked in... working titles: 'Kill Your Boss' and 'Say What you Mean and Mean What You Say'... light-hearted stuff, like...
But, while it is nice to have taken the time to write, I fear it may have lulled us into a nest of complacency... see; we went a bit bonkers and booked a shit load of gigs, which is cool, but I'm not entirely certain we thought through how the hell we are going to pay for getting to them!!! Hence the title of this blog... I, for one, kinda forgot, or at least chose not to remember, the utter fiasco that gigs can be and I definitely chose to neglect to recall the cost of doing shows where you have to travel further than the other side of town...
We've got some hikes to do... nothing ridiculous, but enough to make me look at what we've got lined up and realise that what little money I have will be going on van hire costs and fuel... on top of that, we are having the awesome MATT GRUNDY (www.diecastdesign.com and http://www.myspace.com/thedeadinthewoods guitarist) doing our Myspace page soon(www.myspace.com/massacreofthemegafauna), and we will need to get another batch of our ludakrisly under priced demo burned off...
My point being, that should there be any angels out there who have a load/a bit of spare cash (a loose fiver would not be turned down) and have a philanthropic itch they need to scratch... well, stuff that filth into an envelope marked 'Save the Megafauna' and send it to us! (NB do not send it to Jimothy though... as a band we have decided that we will have nothing to do with his fundraising attempts for the sex-change op he's always wanted...)
Either way, we hope to see you down at one of the shows... we're gonna enjoy 'em so you may as well do the same!
Peace,
b!x
Friday, 26 March 2010
Friday, 5 March 2010
Phase 2a
It’ll be weird, in a year’s, time to look back and see how exciting these first months have been…
It’s quite cool to be involved in a project where systematic positivity is just implicit in the working of the band. By that I mean; we have unwittingly, though quite serendipitously (though perhaps not quite as accidentally as that), structured our activity into what could become a very useful and efficient tactical and strategic cycle, running something like – Write, Record, Perform.
As outlined in prior blogs the story has been – band together, write tunes, record tunes, do gigs. Not saying this is a novel approach to doing anything, but each project has had multiple aims, set by ourselves, and we seem to be able to jump through our hoops satisfactorily, finishing up in a place where we can raise the bar and progress in a very tangible way, which I find incredibly valuable and is something which has been lacking in most other musical projects I have been involved with…
So now we are back at the stage ‘2a’ of the second phase… writing new tunes…
The first 2 tunes were pretty much written by the time I joined in mid autumn ’09 and the third tune was in a strong skeletal form by the time Ecks joined. The development of the fourth is, for some reason, a bit of a blur, and I get the feeling – though I could be mistaken – that it was ‘completed’ for the sake of getting on stage and accordingly, may very well change structure and (I feel should) be split into 2 songs…
Point being, we are now at a stage where we are largely writing from scratch… sure there are riffs floating about that any one of us may have been carrying for a while, but it’s all new to each other member…
It is noticeable that we are figuring out each other’s writing style and it’s quite fun, and for the most part funny, to see how we communicate, fight for and impress our ideas upon the music. But it’s also noticeable that, between us, we seem to have what I call a ‘good metal head’, a strong sense of good Metal musicianship, which is not something that every Metal musician has…
On the other side, there are some clunky ideas in there that are remnants of the tussles that have arisen in the writing process, usually the consequence of a couple of us trying to micro-manage certain passages of a given tune…
One of the interesting things that I will be watching is how the Rhythm section develops, given that Luke and Ecks haven’t known each other long, and that they are both incredibly nice, polite and non-egocentric fellahs… I’m expecting mintness…
As for me, well, I’ve got work to do too… it’s fucking so cool to have these tunes to sing over; I’m not sure if we are very ground breaking or necessarily pushing any boundaries, but the music we are writing has, to my ears at least, a real sense of Metal and Rock heritage and as the songs are threaded together riff by riff, my ears can hear exactly where the vocals could sit. While this is, undoubtedly, a very formulaic approach to writing vocals, it is such a pleasure to be writing tunes that will be the cause of some serious neck muscle strainage when performed live and may even provoke a singalong…
…like I say, it’ll be weird in a year’s time…
Mint!
b!x
It’s quite cool to be involved in a project where systematic positivity is just implicit in the working of the band. By that I mean; we have unwittingly, though quite serendipitously (though perhaps not quite as accidentally as that), structured our activity into what could become a very useful and efficient tactical and strategic cycle, running something like – Write, Record, Perform.
As outlined in prior blogs the story has been – band together, write tunes, record tunes, do gigs. Not saying this is a novel approach to doing anything, but each project has had multiple aims, set by ourselves, and we seem to be able to jump through our hoops satisfactorily, finishing up in a place where we can raise the bar and progress in a very tangible way, which I find incredibly valuable and is something which has been lacking in most other musical projects I have been involved with…
So now we are back at the stage ‘2a’ of the second phase… writing new tunes…
The first 2 tunes were pretty much written by the time I joined in mid autumn ’09 and the third tune was in a strong skeletal form by the time Ecks joined. The development of the fourth is, for some reason, a bit of a blur, and I get the feeling – though I could be mistaken – that it was ‘completed’ for the sake of getting on stage and accordingly, may very well change structure and (I feel should) be split into 2 songs…
Point being, we are now at a stage where we are largely writing from scratch… sure there are riffs floating about that any one of us may have been carrying for a while, but it’s all new to each other member…
It is noticeable that we are figuring out each other’s writing style and it’s quite fun, and for the most part funny, to see how we communicate, fight for and impress our ideas upon the music. But it’s also noticeable that, between us, we seem to have what I call a ‘good metal head’, a strong sense of good Metal musicianship, which is not something that every Metal musician has…
On the other side, there are some clunky ideas in there that are remnants of the tussles that have arisen in the writing process, usually the consequence of a couple of us trying to micro-manage certain passages of a given tune…
One of the interesting things that I will be watching is how the Rhythm section develops, given that Luke and Ecks haven’t known each other long, and that they are both incredibly nice, polite and non-egocentric fellahs… I’m expecting mintness…
As for me, well, I’ve got work to do too… it’s fucking so cool to have these tunes to sing over; I’m not sure if we are very ground breaking or necessarily pushing any boundaries, but the music we are writing has, to my ears at least, a real sense of Metal and Rock heritage and as the songs are threaded together riff by riff, my ears can hear exactly where the vocals could sit. While this is, undoubtedly, a very formulaic approach to writing vocals, it is such a pleasure to be writing tunes that will be the cause of some serious neck muscle strainage when performed live and may even provoke a singalong…
…like I say, it’ll be weird in a year’s time…
Mint!
b!x
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