I had never heard of February Album Writing Month [FAWM] before this year but it seems to have actually been around for quite some time. The idea behind it is that you commit to writing 14 songs in 28 days. Since 2012 is a leap year, it’s going to be 14 1/2 songs over 29 days this time around. So basically 15 songs over the entire month.
The approach I’m taking is one of experimentalism and fun. With all of the ‘serious’ [contractual] work I’m doing on other projects, I have felt a strong desire to just goof around and create something. FAWM provides this opportunity to me.
I want to make it very clear that none of these recordings are “An Early Morning Letter, Displaced” material. I may pull ideas from these tracks for future work – but as of now this all stands on its own as simple, raw, sonic experimentalism…
Visit my FAWM page and listen to recordings at http://fawm.org/fawmers/josephlabrecque/.
Selected Comments:
“Well done. Brings some of Moody Blues work to mind. The spoken word is delivered perfectly.” – bking on darkenedshore
“Ethereal and strangely relaxing. Thanks!” – crispy8888 on deepfever
“i cant believe this is a zong. it’s so raw and powerful. it evokes so much. now i’m going to listen to your others.” -evelbist on childrensleep
“It feels like a march on a stormy shoreline with landmines going off around me.” – bradbrubaker on plaguemarch
“It’s dusk in a rundown part of the city and the camera moves along the street people shuffling along stooped in the cold. This music is playing.” – drdjangomango on quietplace
“Nice, dark piece here… very cinematic and minimal. I can hear something bubbling under the surface.” – looprication on shiverechos
“That was incredible! It definitely had a very chilling/cold feel to it. Perfect for the title of the song. I almost felt it could’ve been a backing track to a movie. Amazing. Keep rockin!” – stepz2nowhere on snowfell
“Wow. Made me feel cold from the first chord. There’s some denseness here that is utterly dark & beautiful. I love the single piano notes that seem to drop into the piece. But I guess that’s the point… snow falling. Great work!” – candle on snowfell
“Nicely constructed. The song before this one on the jukebox was really quiet…so I had it turned up. Then your tune started and “wham!” it hit me in the headphones at work. So I turned it up even more Great job!” – devin on isnothing
“Tipped over the edge into a dark dystopian major city in the not to distant future. It works well on an emotional level, I can still “feel” it’s grip after it has ended.” – ickabodsane on shalliarrive
“This is kind of horrifying. How am I supposed to go to sleep now? :x” – whisperedcandles on isnothing
“I’m going to have nightmares. Very intense!” – degausser on tendertrappings
Also of note; the image I’m using to represent this body of work was created with Photoshop Touch on my Transformer Prime tablet. I’m having a bit of fun with PS Touch and thought this rough sketch would work perfectly along with the raw tracks being recorded.
UPDATE 2/26/2012:
I actually did it. 14 tracks! This is on top of my full-time job, writing a book or two, recording a bunch of materials for video2brain, and being down nearly 2 weeks with fever and sinus infection! wow!
I’ll probably arrange these tracks into a proper album order and release them through FVM somehow as a freebie in the next few days.
UPDATE 3/1/2012:
Hey, didn’t even realize that you wrote music. Good stuff.
Thanks. It’s been fun so far. To think: I only have one semi-negative comment :D
I’m in the market for a midi controller to do this as well. I don’t want it too small as I’m learning piano too so I want to use it for lessons as well. Any suggestions? Assuming you are using one yourself.. :)
I use an old Alesis QS7 as a midi controller. It is BIG.