Hello everyone! I know what you're thinking... "Woah! A blog entry!" That's how I feel also.
I figured due to the lack of activity during the hiatus period, it might be a good idea to say something. In the last few days, I saw an article on one of the Roxette websites I follow, which had Per Gessle (the male half of the duo) giving some background info on selected songs in the band's career. So I thought this might be a good idea for our own material.
So, for however long it takes to do so, I will be giving a little insight on each track that has been released via SDP. Whether it be Kingrow or n-Somnia, it doesn't matter. I will, however, leave the Gosney commentary up to Forbes to do, if he wishes to do so. If he does follow suit, it'll be on his own blog page.
Kicking off Part 1 of this series, which I'll be calling "Song Stories", will be the 2007 release, "Kingrow Online". Here we go!
#1 - ANDROID
This is one of those songs that I feel was a good idea at the time. Don't get me wrong, it sounds good. But after a while, it does tend to get a little on the repetitive side. Being 6-minutes long doesn't help with that either. Also, being the opening track may not help keep people's attention. Not sure why I decided to do that. But oh well, it's too late now...
#2 - DEATH IS THE CURE
Since this is Forbes' song, there's not a lot I can say about the writing of this one, but I can say that it's a classic Kingrow track. Forbes has expressed his fondness of it so much, that he had made several different mixes of the song over time. Not many of which ended up being released, however. You can find other mixes of this song in the Gosney archive. A perfect selection for the first promo track (out of 3 in total).
#3 - FUNKING GOOD
One of the first batch of Forbes' songs presented to me in the first days of Kingrow back in 2004. The first version of the song - the Down-Step Mix, featured on "Kingrow Online Again" (2009) - was actually the original. While presenting the song to me, Forbes decided to re-work the part of the track after the tempo speeds up. In the original, after the music stops, the tempo rapidly drops back to the original BPM, while in this version it's already reset when the music starts up again. That particular part is really the only difference between the 2 versions. Always loved the industrial sound of this song.
#4 - DESERT SCORN
Originally released as an n-Somnia song back in 2004, before the second hiatus (1st from 2003-04, 2nd from 2004-06). It was moved to the Kingrow archive, along with a few others, when n-Somnia momentarily retired in 2006. The title was given due to images in my mind while listening to the song, of a man lost in a desert somewhere. I decided to be clever and make it sound similar to Desert Storm.
#5 - GOAT PORN
This is Forbes' song. Don't ask me how he came up with the title... I was actually in the same room when he composed this track, so I do have a little bit of knowledge on its conception. It may sound very wrong (and it probably is), but I can imagine this song, if it had a music video, featuring 2 characters dressed in gimp suits doing some weird dance moves to the beat and tune of this track. Maybe it's the influence of the title? Who knows...
#6 - JAMMED
One of Forbes' finest creations. Don't know much about its background, but I remember growing fond of it rather quickly. A part of how it ended up on "Kingrow Online", I suppose. My favourite part has to be when the ambient keyboards come in about halfway into it. Very 80's. You'd think I would've written it.
#7 - JAM
Based on a short snippet that I composed in 2002 during the early years of n-Somnia, then called "No Name Noise", but now called "Jam (demo)" after this song's completion. The main guitar loop from the 'demo' version is what inspired this finalised mix. I called it "Jam" because of its rehearsal room atmosphere. Electric guitars, drumkit sounds, just like the good old days of Supertrip, but with added electronic noises. I miss those days.
BONUS TRACKS
#1 - THE DOOR OF A THOUSAND FACES
One of Forbes' longest compositions, and another to have more than one version, this track featured on one of our comedy albums for "Ducksel FM" - The 'Best Of' episode - along with "M. Stands for Murder". It was released along side of "M" as a double A-side single to promote the comedy album, and try to get some more attention towards the Kingrow project simultaneously. Technically our first non-album single as Kingrow, even though the tracks are actually from an album. It's simpler than I've just explained. Trust me.
#2 - M. STANDS FOR MURDER
Also penned by Forbes, this is the second track from the comedy album mentioned above. The song's title comes from 1996, believe it or not! When Forbes and I attempted (and failed) world fame with our first project, Swede, we churned out literally hundreds of song titles (well, I did personally). This was one of Forbes' contributions.
#3 - THE FALSE PROPHET
This was one of my weird experiments. I was watching a lot of endtime prophecy videos at this point of my life (2007), and one group of videos in particular often used a track from "The Matrix" soundtrack, called "Clubbed to Death" by Rob Dougan. It inspired me enough to make a track that would have a similar atmosphere...almost. As for those prophecy videos, I attempted to make one of my own with this song as the soundtrack for it, making this the first Kingrow song with its own music video. It was merely a slideshow of prophecy-related images with the track laid over it. That video no longer exists, however, as some of my current beliefs would now clash with some of the images I used initially. There are no plans to remake the video. By the way, that weird vocal track that sounds backward... It is. The official name is 'backmasking', and is often referred to as subliminal messages. That Led Zeppelin "Stairway to Heaven" story - this is the same kind of thing, but with a twist. While "Stairway" gets the finger pointed at it for allegedly having demonic messages hidden in the background, "The False Prophet" is not only blatantly putting the message up front and out loud for everyone to hear, it is also making it easy for someone to find out what it really says...and here it is... "I am speaking in reverse." Is that so evil? Didn't think so. And for anyone who's interested, the voice is neither mine nor Forbes'. I recorded the sound of Microsoft Sam reciting the sentence, right before I lowered the pitch several steps, slowed it down, then reversed it. It's a piece of cake.
NEXT EPISODE - "7-SIDED PARALLEL".
I figured due to the lack of activity during the hiatus period, it might be a good idea to say something. In the last few days, I saw an article on one of the Roxette websites I follow, which had Per Gessle (the male half of the duo) giving some background info on selected songs in the band's career. So I thought this might be a good idea for our own material.
So, for however long it takes to do so, I will be giving a little insight on each track that has been released via SDP. Whether it be Kingrow or n-Somnia, it doesn't matter. I will, however, leave the Gosney commentary up to Forbes to do, if he wishes to do so. If he does follow suit, it'll be on his own blog page.
Kicking off Part 1 of this series, which I'll be calling "Song Stories", will be the 2007 release, "Kingrow Online". Here we go!
#1 - ANDROID
This is one of those songs that I feel was a good idea at the time. Don't get me wrong, it sounds good. But after a while, it does tend to get a little on the repetitive side. Being 6-minutes long doesn't help with that either. Also, being the opening track may not help keep people's attention. Not sure why I decided to do that. But oh well, it's too late now...
#2 - DEATH IS THE CURE
Since this is Forbes' song, there's not a lot I can say about the writing of this one, but I can say that it's a classic Kingrow track. Forbes has expressed his fondness of it so much, that he had made several different mixes of the song over time. Not many of which ended up being released, however. You can find other mixes of this song in the Gosney archive. A perfect selection for the first promo track (out of 3 in total).
#3 - FUNKING GOOD
One of the first batch of Forbes' songs presented to me in the first days of Kingrow back in 2004. The first version of the song - the Down-Step Mix, featured on "Kingrow Online Again" (2009) - was actually the original. While presenting the song to me, Forbes decided to re-work the part of the track after the tempo speeds up. In the original, after the music stops, the tempo rapidly drops back to the original BPM, while in this version it's already reset when the music starts up again. That particular part is really the only difference between the 2 versions. Always loved the industrial sound of this song.
#4 - DESERT SCORN
Originally released as an n-Somnia song back in 2004, before the second hiatus (1st from 2003-04, 2nd from 2004-06). It was moved to the Kingrow archive, along with a few others, when n-Somnia momentarily retired in 2006. The title was given due to images in my mind while listening to the song, of a man lost in a desert somewhere. I decided to be clever and make it sound similar to Desert Storm.
#5 - GOAT PORN
This is Forbes' song. Don't ask me how he came up with the title... I was actually in the same room when he composed this track, so I do have a little bit of knowledge on its conception. It may sound very wrong (and it probably is), but I can imagine this song, if it had a music video, featuring 2 characters dressed in gimp suits doing some weird dance moves to the beat and tune of this track. Maybe it's the influence of the title? Who knows...
#6 - JAMMED
One of Forbes' finest creations. Don't know much about its background, but I remember growing fond of it rather quickly. A part of how it ended up on "Kingrow Online", I suppose. My favourite part has to be when the ambient keyboards come in about halfway into it. Very 80's. You'd think I would've written it.
#7 - JAM
Based on a short snippet that I composed in 2002 during the early years of n-Somnia, then called "No Name Noise", but now called "Jam (demo)" after this song's completion. The main guitar loop from the 'demo' version is what inspired this finalised mix. I called it "Jam" because of its rehearsal room atmosphere. Electric guitars, drumkit sounds, just like the good old days of Supertrip, but with added electronic noises. I miss those days.
BONUS TRACKS
#1 - THE DOOR OF A THOUSAND FACES
One of Forbes' longest compositions, and another to have more than one version, this track featured on one of our comedy albums for "Ducksel FM" - The 'Best Of' episode - along with "M. Stands for Murder". It was released along side of "M" as a double A-side single to promote the comedy album, and try to get some more attention towards the Kingrow project simultaneously. Technically our first non-album single as Kingrow, even though the tracks are actually from an album. It's simpler than I've just explained. Trust me.
#2 - M. STANDS FOR MURDER
Also penned by Forbes, this is the second track from the comedy album mentioned above. The song's title comes from 1996, believe it or not! When Forbes and I attempted (and failed) world fame with our first project, Swede, we churned out literally hundreds of song titles (well, I did personally). This was one of Forbes' contributions.
#3 - THE FALSE PROPHET
This was one of my weird experiments. I was watching a lot of endtime prophecy videos at this point of my life (2007), and one group of videos in particular often used a track from "The Matrix" soundtrack, called "Clubbed to Death" by Rob Dougan. It inspired me enough to make a track that would have a similar atmosphere...almost. As for those prophecy videos, I attempted to make one of my own with this song as the soundtrack for it, making this the first Kingrow song with its own music video. It was merely a slideshow of prophecy-related images with the track laid over it. That video no longer exists, however, as some of my current beliefs would now clash with some of the images I used initially. There are no plans to remake the video. By the way, that weird vocal track that sounds backward... It is. The official name is 'backmasking', and is often referred to as subliminal messages. That Led Zeppelin "Stairway to Heaven" story - this is the same kind of thing, but with a twist. While "Stairway" gets the finger pointed at it for allegedly having demonic messages hidden in the background, "The False Prophet" is not only blatantly putting the message up front and out loud for everyone to hear, it is also making it easy for someone to find out what it really says...and here it is... "I am speaking in reverse." Is that so evil? Didn't think so. And for anyone who's interested, the voice is neither mine nor Forbes'. I recorded the sound of Microsoft Sam reciting the sentence, right before I lowered the pitch several steps, slowed it down, then reversed it. It's a piece of cake.
NEXT EPISODE - "7-SIDED PARALLEL".