As you may have heard from Facebook updates, a couple of weeks ago, I took a week off from work to write and record a new album. I did the same thing with Sour Grapes two years ago (almost to the day) and was very pleased with the outcome.
“Get to some place locked away and live to fight another day”
Normally, I would have updated here more often with progress and teasers, but it’s still a little too fresh for me at this point. For example, I just changed the name of one of the songs yesterday and came up with the album title and concept a few days ago.
“Barricade windows and doors and pray”
The new album is called Feel No Pain. It’s 11 tracks and around 38 minutes long. I have been mixing and cleaning up every day since principle tracking was completed on Sunday, November 7. Once I finished recording, I took a couple of hours off, then started mixing. The first round of mixes was completed at 11:59 Sunday night. I am now on the 13th round of mixes.
“They just won’t stay down and feel no pain, no”
Anyway, Feel No Pain is a zombie reference and the album art will be Night of the Living Dead (1968) themed. Apparently, it’s in the Public Domain now. Good news for me! The title track, Feel No Pain, is a zombie apocalypse story, and an example of why you wouldn’t want to be stuck in that situation with me.
“I left them by the road. There are hundreds by the road.”
I’m very excited to get these tracks and the album released. The album is much darker and heavier than the music I normally make, though not as dark and heavy as I was originally hoping for. The working title throughout the writing and recording process was “Melvin’s Helmet”, because the songs on the album are a mix of slow, low, droning Melvins heaviness and more up-tempo, driving Helmet heaviness with snappy drumming. In the end, with all the tracking done, the songs sound much more like Helmet than the Melvins (luckily, I guess, that means it’s easier to listen to).
“Forgive me, forgive me”
More news will be posted here as it comes available. I hope to release Feel No Pain in the next week or two on the site here and make it available on The James Machine’s BandCamp page as well.
