This EP collects four of my released tracks released between May 2021 and May 2023 into one place. I've had this collection as a playlist on my phone for the past few months and wanted to share it. I've cleaned up the mixes from their original releases.
These songs tell a story of attempts to thrive in spite of misery, of finding mystery and beauty where most don't bother to look; and in their dreary, moody, melancholic way, these songs through both their themes or what I have learned about myself in the process of learning how to finish them have been a catalyst for myself to finally get a diagnosis for ADHD and to start dealing with lifelong depression.
### Track Notes:
*Rouse the Fragments*: This was originally released on the Triplicate Records spring-themed compilation, *Music for Magnolia Trees*. I took inspiration from spring in the Coastal Pacific Northwest, which comes in fits and starts, where we’re on the tail end of the majority of the sunless seasons, with a few nice days teasing something brighter as early as March, and a yet a June so dreary it’s often called _Juneuary_.
*Passage of Remnants*: Originally released on the Triplicate Records compilation *Music for Dotted Lines*, I started the piece by imagining I was writing for the soundtrack to a video game I had wanted to make half a lifetime ago, for an area of exploring the ruins of a advanced but departed civilization. I wrote this in the early part of 2022, while dealing with burnout from unfulfilling work, pandemic parenting, and especially the burnout of undiagnosed ADHD.
*Where Shadows Bloom*: Originally released as the B-side to my early 2022 single *When Both Became Neither*, this actually started as a piece for a prompt challenge in fall 2021 – the prompt being in two parts: write a piece with ten parts, then discard six of them. I was mostly happy with how it turned out, but a week later a new melody for the climax & ending parts (starts about 1:45) started playing in my head, I really liked the way it fit.
*Prelude to Blue Hour*: Originally released on the Triplicate Records compilation *Time Lapse*, which had a time limit of two and a half minutes. Some years prior I commuted by bicycle through an area in Portland where the light rail and a freeway interchange came together in a mass of bridges. This piece was inspired one evening on my way home, I heard someone busking, hearing them fade in an out as I moved through the urban landscape, as their sound echoed off all the bridges, intermingled with the noise of rush-hour traffic and trains. The pad sound in this piece is based on a (separate) recording I made of Portland’s MAX light rail train.
credits
released December 1, 2023
Synthesizers & Sampling, Field Recording, Piano, Melodica, Guitar; Production, Cover Photo: Matthew Lyon
Mastering: Michael Southard
Special Thanks: Alyssa, Jacob, Jason, Jeremy, Jerrett, Luisa, Tim
The forthcoming "Between Waves" from The Album Leaf, their first in six years, is layered and expansive, grounded in mournful melodies. Bandcamp New & Notable Jul 18, 2016