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Download: Long Mp3
The second ‘single’ from the forthcoming new album. This time things are slowly progressive: moving through a contrast of a dark soundscape with a funky house pulse, building incrementally to lush epic-pop drama. Those listening from the tracking scene might pick a certain influence of Xerxes here, and I’ve no doubt the years of listening to him have rubbed off here.
A minimal journey into the night:
[i]—
Long
It’s long…
Feels like I’ve been waiting here
Forever
Long into the night
A night that never ends
I long for you.
It’s OK
The waiting is right
A combination of choices
Turns silence to voices
But not yet
No not yet
Still so long to wait.
I can wait
For you, forever
Long quiet
Long dark
Longing, as the thunder rolls in…
—[/i]
In 2006 I was playing guitar for a jam band which met locally at an old and cold farm cottage outside of town. The project was roughly called ‘Unity Gain’ and never got further than some wonderful funky improv with all sorts of musical elements clashing in unexpected ways. I was on guitar, Luke was on bass and keys (and responsible for computers and recording), Dylan was on bluesy keys, and of course Iain MacKay was on his hybrid electro-acoustic drum set-up. We spent many long Autumn and Winter nights meandering through some interesting jams coming across many little gems of music along the way.
Things never got too dark and heavy as there was an agreement to keep the aim uplifting. Born out of a little frustration with the process the later jams started to wander into darker passionate places. One of these were recorded and I’d like to offer to you here as an mp3. It’s started out in our typical style moving around half formed clichés and unrealised flows, until about 19 minutes in it all starts to really come together. All of sudden a pounding sad doom started to form in Gminor and I chanced upon a simple descending ostinato rooted on the minor 1st and 3rd, while playing out the 7th, 6th and 5th. For months and months afterwards I had this little riff stuck in my head - I loved it’s ambiguous feel of longing, a paradoxical sad resolution.
I just had to make a song out of it! I wanted to make something that had the same building tension as the jam, but not using the same method to get there. I also had a strong desire to build something progressive like an Arvo Pärt piece that had a balance between mechanical repetition and organic flowing melody. But for some crazy reason a funky house beat ended up in there! So by late 2006 I had a very muted and murky G#minor build (to make use of the natural E) without much variation until the point where the chords start to really seriously shift around - and then I had to leave the project for almost a year while I went through the dramas of fixing my studio computer.
In 2007 as Winter started to make way for Spring I picked up the song and quickly hammered out the rest of the 11 minute structure. Whatever idea came to me I simply honoured by putting it in without any concerns of being reductive to any pop rule set - no fussing! With spirited focus every came easy with this song, despite the fact that months upon months of work was done on every single element. Even the vocals, which are usually very hard for me, seemed to slot into place almost too easy (Here I have to thank Ruth Strut for some serious vocal tuition to break me out of some bad long term habits). The result is a long-winded journey into a progressive dirge in the dark, mounting tension from dreamy obscurity to pounding anxiety.
Long won’t be for everyone, it’s lengthy meandering celebrates all things that gently take their time, sometimes drilling energy with hypnotic forgetfulness. Sometimes such is the nature of waiting, of longing. This song is for those waiting.
More in two weeks.
