News on my EPs

Thought I should clarify what's going on with my EP's... :)

I wanted to split my recorded songs into different EPs, so that each EP had a flowing 'theme'. Therefore I am recording several EP's all at once and I'm just adding to each EP as and when I record a new song for it.

Demo
Recorded in 2005 - this is finished so I'm not adding any tracks to this.
1. Wish On The Moon
2. Bite
3. In History
4. Takin' The High
5. So Worthwhile

Eight English Months
This is for songs mainly with acoustic guitar accompaniment.

5 Minutes
Anything on here is cover versions... Since these are not my songs, I have not put them available to download from anywhere but you can just email me and I will send them to you :)

[to be confirmed]
This is my most exciting project as it is more electronica based. Just 2 tracks recorded for this so far "Spirit Like You" and "Theories from Von Krahl" but I have a few bubbling under :-p

Live Sessions
These are all songs recorded on my iPhone so they're not excellent quality but I have sooo many songs and I don't want them to get lost forever in my brain somewhere, so everytime I play an old song for someone, I try and record it. I have a few that I can add to this so I need to upload them.

I'll also be having an EP for songs that have piano accompaniment mainly because these tend to be quite dark so I think they will all fit pretty well together on the same CD. For anyone who knows my music - this will be tracks such as A Secret Love, Deeper Interaction, No Soul I Know Could Live Without Love, Matthew MoreOrLess etc.

Links to all my downloads are on my Last.FM page.

Yay 2010 is an exciting year :-D

That's it for now...

Looking forward to tonight as I'm going to sit on the patio in the sun, drink red wine, and rehearse my songs for Friday's competition!

Ableton for Mac now LIVE!! Ace. Face. Of. Pies.

Yesteday evening was ace. Period.

I got home and managed to get Ableton Live 7 for Mac. This put me in *such* a good mood cos my Mac actual has a bit of power behind it so composing on that will be like composing on a real computer woooo! Lappy is sooooo slow with Ableton but I had already started a song on there from the other night which started off being inspired by a Demdike Stare song but I ended up working on it aaaaall night and now it's turned into a kinda Dark Progressive House / Minimal style song.... It felt really good to be creating again... I don't often feel the thrill from writing guitar or piano songs anymore unless something really hits me but I loved recording this last night with 3 different bass lines, 3 different drum tracks, and I bought some congos last weekend and they're included on there too (although to be honest they sound more like tom toms due to mic positioning but thats ok...!) So I really wanna go home and finish it off now! Would be ace to have a new song out so early in the year... I recorded a little demo the other night called "No Sweet Conversation" but I was only messing around and then after realised that the mic was set up wrong and had only recorded in one speaker! haha So may work on that again another time and add some strings and harmonies too...

Hmmmm I'm sure paragraphs aren't meant to be that long!

Returning to Shine... and Garageband

Am listening to Joni Mitchell's "Shine" album right now... It feels completely appropriate for my feelings at the moment... When I first got into this album, it was Autumn/Winter 2007 and I was living with Mark at The Apple Building and I was completely in love with him...but by this particular point I knew that nothing was going to happen between us... And I just felt completely devastated inside and I used to go to a branch of Starbucks and they would always be playing Shine. At the time, I felt like I had lost an integral part of me... In reality I had lost nothing but my faith in a fantasy... I had realised, for real, that nothing was ever going to happen between Mark and I... and that had took a year to surface in my mind... Obviously I'd lost something that I never had in the first place, but whenever you lose something dear to you, you are going to have a period of mourning...and that's what I had to do for a while in order to come back stronger afterwards. Both listening to Shine, and going to this Starbucks after work and having a relaxing coffee gave me sooooo much comfort... I thought I was never going to hear another new Joni Mitchell album.. in fact she hadn't released one since I had got into her music in 2003 so it was absolutely amazing when the album came out, also when I actually liked it, and then even more so when it started to hold so much significance to me.

I feel kind of the same now. I've lost Sandeep and this is my period of mourning. It's so strange because I haven't felt like listening to Shine since I got over Mark... Whenever I listened to it, it just felt like I was tapping into a feeling that I didn't want to address... a feeling of desolateness, weakenss, starting from scratch, finding myself again... But all of those things I feel again right now... and this album now feels just as important, as relevant and as comforting as it did 2 years ago... The funny thing is I never really got over Mark until I met Sandeep...

I've written a lot of lyrics this week about mine and San's break up... I don't know why, but this week has been the most difficult week since we first split back in December... It shouldn't be because Tarni is home and I have more people around... But I guess I'm just feeling lost. I just don't know what to do!! I'm confused.

I was sooooo happy last year... In periods during the past, I have had happiness but I don't think I'd ever had such a feeling of contentness as I had last year. I remember I'd leave work at the wekeend and drive to Dublin to the airport and I'd be listening to Alas I Cannot Swim by Laura Marling and thinking about what me and Sandeep were going to get up to that weekend... I'd catch my flight, I'd have a small bottle of red wine and I'd sit on the plane just thinking how lucky I was to have such a wonderful guy to be with, to have parents that love me, to have such caring friends, to have got my big break in my career, to be talented enough to write my own songs and express myself, I'd even think about how lucky I was to have grown up in a country where I got an education, and a decent place to live... I don't think I'd ever felt so thankful to the world and I was so happy to admit it. I started writing songs for an EP and even the lyrics were positive...

"Suddenly I feel
Like I'm on holiday
I'll talk to strangers
I'll read in cafes

I'll wake up at dawn
Even in the summer
I'll watch every sunrise
And I'll feel stronger

And when I wake
I'm straight out of bed
And I feel rested
Watered and fed

Finally I feel
And I don't have to think
Soon all will be in place
Finding my missing link"

This was early Summer... and then Summer was amazing too... and then I don't know what happened...

All I have to do though is get through these few months and I know that I will be ok. I need to plan. I need things to work towards and to look forward to.

Music-wise, I've had a good week... I wrote this crazy experimental piece on Tuesday night... but it was a bit mental - crazy rhythms with a vocal part over the top... I bought 2 congos over the weekend so I've been playing those a bit too. And I've been learning to use a new software programme called Garageband which I got free with my iMac. Although I really don't want to, I want to buy Abelton Suiter but its about €700.... it's absolutely extortionate... and I certainly can't afford it right now...

So I'll make use of Garageband for the time being...

Ok...time for me to go....x