In which it all went a bit crazy ... (part 3)

Well... life continues to take some odd twists and turns, and of late there has been a number of those moments where one stands back, looks curiously at oneself and says 'what on Earth is happening?'

Whilst not exactly racing up the billboard top 100, our little record has done wonders again, with reviews starting to filter in here there and everywhere, and most have been remarkably positive.

Sales have been gratifyingly robust too as reviews are pointing more and more potential audients toward the group and our music, and people from far-flung corners of the planet are seemingly turning up to join the family, so to speak.

As a boy, this is all I dreamed of doing. Making a record that people would appreciate that involved no concession to commercialism. In many ways, it is a dream that can only be realised through the power of the internet - circa 2010, and its fair to say that forced to use the previous method of musical distribution and audience building, Anubis would probably not have survived, in much the same way that Department did not survive and Altered State did not survive.

Thankfully living in that age, we are gladly and proudly cultivating a fan-base that takes in Europe, Japan, America (Nth and Sth) and Asia. We took an order yesterday from the Ukraine and the very idea still makes me gasp. Especially seeing as how this guy paid for a CD- in the Ukraine, you can download a pirate copy from soundike for $1.99, and we won't see a cent. So good on him for supporting Australian music!!!

So, essentially, the word of mouth is continuing to build. Progarchives is beginning to build reviews, as we are sitting on a very healthy 4.13/5 in total. iTunes has 10 5-star reviews attached to our album, so thanks to all the family for that. I suspect a few of those would be friends though, so it's perhaps a little less exciting. An Italian webzine wrote a very favourable article and gave us essentially a 7/10, which is really good - given the rest of the stuff they reviewed!

The biggest news on that front is a review from a French magazine. I can't post the translation, as Nick has asked me to refrain for now, at least until his grandfather gives us a decent one. One that doesn't refer to me as a 'tablecloth'(?) would be nice. The gist was that 230503 had become the reviewers second 'pick of 2010', and that he absolutely loved it. A 9/10 score, followed by two other reviewers posting 8/10 scores. Wow. I always loved France.

So while the toddler is going through pre-scool, figuratively speaking, we have been busy fertilising eggs in the studio. The new album, musically, is pretty much formed, and we are now down to working out the finer details of the arrangements. A couple are about ready to do full-band demos of, and that process is something I have been anticipating for some time. I have been itching to get back to the nitty-gritty headbutting of the creative process. Whilst, naturally, it's lovely to sit back and watch cash roll in, its still far nicer to actually be engaged in making music.

The new album, when it's finished, will go by the name of 'A Tower Of Silence'. It is a 9-part song cycle, based around the story of the life and death of an 11 year old girl who died in a poor asylum in 19th century England. As communicated by her Earthbound apparition. It's a very cool concept, and one track, 'Archway of Tears', will likely be debuted very very soon on stage.

The process was different to last time in as much as all 6 of us sat around a table and discussed the concept, and developed a rough storyboard based around the songs that Rob, myself and Doug had already amassed. Taking the rough storyboard, Rob and I then went and developed the framework and put it back to the guys for their input, and hopefully approval. It was unanimously accepted and we had our second album. The songs are then, one-by-one being developed in the rehearsal studio, playing with sounds, arrangements, chord voicings and segues. Ah... that nitty-gritty.

I heard back the recording of last night earlier this evening and was genuinely astonished by the rate at which the songs are moving forward. I shall not elaborate as some of the working titles are not at all pleasant or intelligent or funny, and thus it's easier to not even mention them. However, the songs themselves will be stellar. Whilst there's no 'Disinfected' on it, there is a longer average track length, and we've not discounted the idea of making the whole thing a continuous piece and indexing the tracks as 'A Tower of Silence' parts 1 - 9 with the subtitle being the track name. I personally like the idea, as the tracks are more like movements of a single continuous piece. However, that may indict squeals of 'pretentious', and of course, we can't have that now, can we?

Our deadline to be ready for the recording proper is November, when Nick goes on (unpaid) maternity leave.

Dean mixing the live tapes

Whilst on the subject of studios, we have began the unenviable task of mixing the live tapes from 'The Wall' in April. Given the technical hitches on the night, there were a few things I needed to repair, but that was nowhere near the task I expected and it's sounding very good. I must confess we haven't been terrifically proactive about getting these out there, and we're looking a Christmas for a digital release. We're not expecting a huge sale, but it's nice to at least give people the option of hearing the live arrangement of the album, as I have a sneaking suspicion I will enjoy it more than it's studio counterpart.

What Dean needs in order to sit through the sessions

It was a toss up between both of the 230503 shows, 'The Wall' and 'The Annandale', and although The Annandale was a practically flawless performance (one dropped drumstick and one guitar in the wrong key, both fixed without losing a beat), the drums were not recorded with an overhead microphone so we are cymbal-less. A crying shame, actually. The good point was that the Wall was the bigger crowd and the better vibe, and Steve was in extremely good form that night. Keyboard glitches aside, it was a great gig. So thats the one we have to mix.

Robert's evident interest in the whole mixing process

Anyway, thats my head clear of thought for this evening. I feel very excited for our musical adventures to come.

"grumble...It's just not fair I have to sit through this f**king record again, so soon, after

spending two years of my life trying to make the last version of it sound good. Why has

Karma taken a big dump on me, yet again. I really rue the day I phoned Eaton and invited him to join my Pink Floyd cover show.... grumble"

And then it all went a little bit madder...

As I sit here, mid June 2010, 12 months ago holding a mastered and as yet unpressed CD in my hand, ruminating on what may happen this coming year, I'd still say I would have been rather surprised at what has 'gone down' so to speak.

230503, whilst obviously not a 'Dark Side Of The Moon', has done way more than a totally unknown prog band from Western Sydney should have done and gone on to sell in Europe, America, Australia (of course) and Japan. That's just the physical CD. It's stocked by German stores, Japanese stores, CDbaby in the US, another online store in the US, can be ordered into US stores if requested (although who would??) and has been reviewed in French, Italian, and in English on ProgArchives (where as we speak, it's sitting on a 4 star rating and is called 'an excellent addition to any prog-rock collection'. What more can I ask?

Downloads have been gratifying with iTunes having

at least 7 five-star reviews. And with only 6 band members, thats... (just kidding). Torrent downloads, whilst we have absolutely no finite way to determine the actual number is looking extremely high - our strange business model of asking nothing for it in order to get it out there has still paid for our next album, in full, before we even begin making it.

The Annandale show was our best ever live performance and the version of 230503 we played that night is probably as close to the definitive version one is ever likely to hear. I get more pleasure from putting on my dodgy bootleg of it and listening to the sheer energy and wall of noise than I do (at the moment) from the subtleties and delicacies of the studio album. The good thing is that like the Wall show, we recorded the Annandale show to multitrack as well and will hopefully be putting it up for download toward the end of the year when Dean has mixed it. The plan being that that will help keep up some momentum and will see us remain visible as the next album is coming up for release.

Which brings me neatly to the next album.

What has happened is that the six of us had a meeting around the time of the Annandale show to discuss the concept and potential storyline for the second album. As usual Rob and I had a number of grand ideas which were largely embraced by the group, and Dean in particular weighed in with a number of alternative ideas which took what we had already gotten into some very exciting areas. Since then, a whole album took shape out of the early demos and now the group is in rehearsal scraping away at the foundations of the next record.

The difference could not be starker. When we made 230503, Rob and I had barely written a note together, and so the concept came first, and the music was slipped around the guidelines as much as possible. This time, we had a basic idea of what we wanted to submit to the band and a wealth of material that really needed arranging and sewing together. As the concept and mood became clearer, at least two fully formed songs that didn't fit the cut were put on the sideline, as well as about 35 bits that we didn't need or couldn't find a decent home for.

Dougie has also contributed much more in a compositional sense than last time too, which adds some different chord progressions to the mix. He had written pretty much all of one song, (with the middle bit generating from Nick and Steve) and also brought in key parts of another two tracks, several chord progressions and ostinatos that made their way into the pieces becoming verses or choruses or sections in their own right.

The next bit is the development of the existing tracks and recording first band demos... we have three tracks that we will do before moving to the next stage, and learning three more.

Assuming we can all agree on what goes where, what sounds good and what fits, we could be back in the studio proper by November, which would be ideal as Nick will be off learning to be a Dad by that point, and will be able to come as and when he can.

I'm hopping onto eBay to buy some gear. I have my eye on some bass pedals :-)))