With the vacation time payout from my job at MAAC, I bought a Korg MS-20 mini synthesizer, summer 2017.
On September 4 of the same year I loaded the first demos of recordings made with it into iTunes.
For about a year and a half I collected recordings made with nothing but one pass (no overdubs) with the MS-20 and guitar effects pedals. Originally I was working toward a double LP-length (80 minutes or so) album of shorter (3-6 minutes) pieces. I quickly blew through those parameters.
About a month ago I tore down the bedroom synth recording rig, having collected 35 recordings totaling four and a half hours of output. This is Only Mostly Dead.
Penciled for release in 2020, I’m sequencing it into three double LP-length digital albums and a single CD compilation Selections from Only Mostly Dead. I understand very well that this is a lot of music and the audience it may resonate with is narrow, but I love it all and hope you will give it a chance.
While the medium – manipulation of pure voltage – may seem impersonal, to my ears at least this is some of the most raw, vulnerable, and emotional music I’ve made. You will hear me improvise, which I’ve never previously done. At all! You will hear many first or second takes. You will hear imperfections galore. For all of the circuitry of the instrument itself, this is very human music, all played directly into the keyboard and knobs, no sequences, nothing automatic.
There are several other projects to share first, including other Night Mode material of my own, but I’m excited to be heading down the path of releasing Only Mostly Dead. As you wish!