Andrew Back On Home Soil

A little while ago if you remember we sent Andrew off to the US of A to fly The Quills flag, so to speak, over there. Well he's been and this week he touched back down on home turf. Apparently he was gone for like 4 weeks but it didn't feel like it. And on that point I can't believe Easter's here already and nearly gone as well!

In typical loose Andrew fashion he didn't book any accommodation before he left and for that matter didn't book any accommodation while he was there. Instead he spent the best part of 4 weeks sleeping on one person's floor and then another person's couch and then on a patch of carpet in someone's home studio between an amp and a drum kit. It worked out well for him (and us I guess) because along the way he met some very cool people. I believe that as I write this he's having a chat with John about everything he managed to do over there. I'm pretty blurry on details but when I get given some information about our plans for the next six months I will gladly share. One thing that's for sure though is that we'll be producing a new record inside the next few months. How good!!

If he's over being jet lagged he might annotate this blog with some more details. But he might not so don't hold your breath.

Meanwhile back in Oz I was continuing the search for a good melody, and decided to take a different approach for a while. Last time it was about sounds, and before that I was arranging a little more during the writing process. For the last little while I've been pretty much opting to go as basic as possible - acoustic guitar, voice, MacBook built in microphone. When there's nothing other than a chord progression and melody you have to work hard to make that melody count. But what you realise is that there's a lot more built into such a simple arrangement than you might think. Chord progressions by themselves have so much natural rhythm and sometimes it's that rhythm that really makes the song. So my focus turned to rhythm and time signatures. I experimented with a few different time signatures but I'm not sure how they'll come out in the wash. 3/4 can be cool but at the same time it can be really boring. You have to be careful. So we'll see whether any of those experiments make it to the finish line.

On an unrelated note I spoiled myself to a few gig outings over the past couple of weeks. Click here to read about them. Sometimes there's nothing better than hearing a band you really like playing a really awesome set. And it does wonders for motivation.

Hope you had a great Easter!!!