Antlerland unexpectedly announces the release of a new album, which is entitled Recombinant Diamond Dust. You can download it straight away at >>antlerland.bandcamp.com<< in happy formats for everyone.
- Opening Up
- Archetype
- Dunkelpunkt
- Stop Torturing Your Brother
- Miss Her Badly - Please Let Me Get Some Sleep
- Capes
- Obnoxiotron
- Disastronaut
- Chroma Key
- Dreaming
© COPYRIGHT 2010 Graham Freeman
Grudnuk Creations - Cat No. GRUD004
Wherein we pretend that these are the liner notes for the reissue of an album from twenty years ago...
Antlerland's previous album Intercapital Daylight (ICD for short) was a release in more ways than one, having dealt with the burden of some venerable songs by finally giving them a definitive form. The Wronghead Versions set further addressed the legacy with what I guess you could call a study of the development of "Wronghead".
Once that was done, the music became less of a priority while other matters were attended for the most of the remained of 2009. These included some technical matters too boring to describe here, such as a new computer system, which helped to speed the process once I returned to the music.
The original vision for this album was somewhat retrograde, in fact, much like the plan for ICD. Several old songs were dragged out of the archives and messed around with until it became apparent that they really weren't going to do. The work wasn't entirely in vain as they'll turn up on one of the two archives collections planned for 2010, but they were shelved once again, allowing the album to find a fresher sound.
Not everything "old" hit the chopping block, "Opening Up" had already had a few years under its belt and was probably the track closest to completion prior to 2009. A few effects were added and some editing done, as the title suggests, it set the scene for what was to come.
Strangely enough for an Antlerland release, most the album was written pretty quickly in recent months. "Archetype" and "Dunkelpunkt" were written from scratch around October. The idea for "Archetype" was that I was going to at least make a stab at a video which would basically be of a stylised pictogrammic town slowly growing out of a grey field before getting stomped on or flattened by something at the end. The idea for the music came from that. The video remains just an idea, but at least the song exists.
"Dunkelpunkt" is just another love letter to motorik-style krautrock, I guess. In my opinion it's one of the best things I've done, so it's just a shame that it's essentially derivative.
"Stop Tormenting Your Brother" was kind of meant as a joke and was released on the website as such, but it grew on me, so a little more work was done there to get it up to scratch for the album version.
"Miss Her Badly" had been kicking around in sketch form, but never sounded as I felt it could, with old tracker formats were dry and unatmospheric by default - you had to work hard and use a number of tricks to provide ambience. Once it became possible, it seemed obvious to drop all manner of wanky effects on to make it work. The "Please Let Me Get Some Sleep" portion was added, based on a melody line from "Chroma Key", and the end result seemed to fit what would be conclusion of the first half of the album.
Only the arabesque opening of "Capes" was extant until December, where the rest of was completed to go with "Dunkelpunkt" for the 2009 Xmas Single. Oh, and it was called "Bring Me The Severed Head Of Rick Wakeman" then, but that was deemed to be a little inappropriate - the song sounds nothing like Severed Heads - and after a couple of other working titles were rejected for being a bit too silly, the simpler title was applied. I'm also pretty sure that the canon at the end isn't particularly original, but I doubt I'll get sued for that. Kookaburra sits on the old gum tree, anybody?
"Obnoxiotron" and "Disastronaut" were concieved in quick succession in January 2010, as the sequencing suggests. I had the idea in my head (probably after absorbing too much JAMC and Neu!), that I really wanted to get some music that managed to sound distorted and a bit foggy yet distinctive at the same time, kind of like the lights of a emergency services car in the distance on a wet night. It doesn't really sound like either of those bands, thankfully, let it not be said that I at least digest my influences to some point. (Though it could also just be that I'm ripping off Ladytron.)
For the melody line of "Obnoxiotron" I was pretty much convinced that it had to sound like someone icing a cake over the murkiness... by squeezing out of a tube of toothpaste. I think it does.
I had the basic idea for "Chroma Key" fleshed out from an improv session a couple of years back, so this was formalised and transferred into sequenced form for the album as the original recording encapsulated the form but was too rough to serve as anything bar a demo. As mentioned earlier, I decided the "middle eight" might work well earlier in the album so the line was also incorporated into "Please Let Me Get Some Sleep".
Recombinant Diamond Dust was a prospective album title I'd been kicking around for years, relating to a "Grey Goo" scenario, and served as the original working title for this project, although "The Shock Of The New" took over for a short time. "Recombinant Diamond Dust" was also the name of one of those tracks that were going to suck, so it was cut, but the name was kept for the album.
Basically that's all I need to say about the album for now. Enjoy listening to it, OR DIE.
- Graham Freeman
February 2010