The Bone Walker sneak preview is up now! The first single – “Something’s Coming” – is out RIGHT NOW. Preorders for the CD are up right now too!

I was going to post this as “PREORDER THE ALBUM YOU FUCKS” but Anna was all NO NO NO NO NO but personally I think that’s a great slogan. She has no idea how to market, I tell you. And yet, I’m taking her advice.

Seriously tho’, preordering pays for the mastering engineer and we need this thing mastered. The whole album won’t ship until January 2015 though so don’t think it’s that kind of gift, ’cause it’s not. But you can have the single RIGHT NOW! which is pretty cool.

GO GO GO GO GO GO GO!

SCREW BLACK FRIDAY, WE’RE DOING THIS RIGHT NOW!

The Bone Walker sneak preview is up RIGHT NOW. The first single – the full-band studio recording of “Something’s Coming” that has been the most-asked-for thing for the last three years – is out RIGHT NOW. Preorders for the CD are up RIGHT NOW.

Preordering pays for the mastering engineer and we need this thing mastered. So RIGHT NOW is a great time to pre-order. The whole album won’t ship until January 2015 and we all gotta deal with it, but the single? You can have that RIGHT NOW.

GO GO GO GO GO GO GO!

Something is coming. Not saying exactly what. I mean, you know it’s not the new album, that’s not coming out ’till January and the big release event at Conflikt.

But something, and something relevant. And soon. Probably Friday. GOSH I WONDER WHAT IT COULD BE. I’m trying to be coy, and frankly, I’m bad at coy. I’m better at orbital bombardments. Oh well, I have a plan, I’ll stick to it. OR WILL I?

Until I decide, enjoy this rock candy and chocolate geode I made. I’m pretty happy with how it came out, particularly after the…

…rocky start I had making it…

Getting ready to try to record horns in my personal studio – a trumpet and a trombone. Frankly, I’m not sure this is going to work. But Shoreline decided we couldn’t use their facilities once they found out there was money involved, which limited our options pretty dramatically – here, the park by the lake, maybe on the bus? That’d add a unique sound – but one way or another, we’re trying it.

Maybe it’s for the best we didn’t get to use Shoreline’s studio. I’ve always used virtual boards, and when I walked into the control room at Shoreline, it was kind of like this:

so many switches

…only much bigger, because they have had some upgrades. Apparently Paul Allen gave them a bunch of stuff and I was all, “…I know what all these knobs do… in theory…”

So, yeah! My studio it is. Wish us luck.

Bone Walker OST Test CD 1

This is where you make the test CD to carry around and put in random players everywhere you stumble across one. Only one track on this CD is not an official release candidate – Anarchy Now/Song for a New Court. Everything else has the “release candidate” tag.

Also, the bonus tracks (oops, did I say tracks?) and the readings aren’t on here yet. Readings get recorded in November.

But you’ll go through a couple of these discs, so that’s not a big deal – particularly given that most of what’s not here are readings. Still, making this milestone – that is a big deal around the lair. Making all this work into a physical object, no matter how raw, still carries some…

…weight?

(ar ar ar ar ar ar ar.)

eta: ALL CORE TRACKS ARE NOW RELEASE CANDIDATES o/

you guys you have no idea how hard it’s gonna be to sit on this album until January, I know you won’t be as excited as I am but yeah I am really excited about this

And in this case, the inspiration I need for these vocals is a psychopath who can throw lighting around like confetti. So I made a little shrine to Azula. I got the idea when I spontaneously added the line, “not you, Zuzu” in rehearsal.

“I imported it from the Fire Nation. They make the best red stuff there!”

Also, you might notice I moved the studio closer to the lava core for this track. Fire nation, j0.

Do you have a crazyspiration, or is that just a supervillain thing? You should get one. It’s motivational.

Eventually when making an album you start mocking it up in players so you can carry it around and play it on random devices and at random people, just to get reactions.

We actually got to that point two weeks ago (less readings and bonus tracks, of course). Here’s a screencap, in iTunes.

It always feels good to get here. Exciting. Particularly when you start playing somebody a really long track, they listen all the way through, get to the next one since it doesn’t autostop, then instead of stopping they keep listening, think they’ve got the idea, reach up to start taking off the headphones…

…and stop halfway up, because oh wait, they don’t. And they keep listening.

I can’t wait for January to get here. 😀

PS: LA LA LA LA LA LA LA

PPS: I have like two keyboards that can play idk six or eight different pianos from samples not including electrics and also a real actual piano but I’m pretty sure this is the first time I’ve ever recorded actual piano playing.

PPPS: spoiler alert: I am not a very good piano player.

PPPPS: …but I am a pretty good editor. XD

PPPPPS: a clew!

It’s been a busy weekend around the lair – and a bit bloggier than usual, too. You might enjoy “GamerGate True Believers are the Anti-Vaxxers of the Online World,” or maybe my ‘okay I’m done’ rant about Doctor Who, written after walking out on “Kill the Moon.” Check comments in particular on that second post, there are some good ones.

Apparently, some people rather liked the episode. I don’t see how, but hey, carry on.

No, here, it’s been mostly paperwork – even supervillains have to catch up on email and clear the desks sometimes – and a decent bit of Legend of Korra! Yes, I’m finally through all of year three. So far behind but so worth it. If you’re one of the people who didn’t get much out of the first year, give it another go, starting, oh, no later than midway through year two, with “The First Avatar.” It really rocketshots after that. I’m pretty sad that year four is probably the last year – it’s been so good. I’ll miss it.

I never did write up that VCON report, dammit. Wrote a bunch of other things, but not that. Here’s a nice one by Steve Fahnestalks at Amazing Stories, if you want, wherein he was kind enough to give me a little shout-out for my drum work. Thanks, Steve! 😀

But even in all the paper catch-up this weekend, music hasn’t been entirely set aside. It’s just mostly been MIDI instruments, which means lots and lots of keyboarding. I’m… vaguely competent on keyboard – good enough for this – but wow, do I have no emotional feel for it. OKAY LET’S PUSH ALL THE BUTTONS DOOT DOOT DOOT OKAY LET’S PUSH ALL THE BUTTONS AGAIN DOOT DOOT DOOT

I’m trying, I really am, I have touch sensitivity and aftertouch and all that, and I’m using it. But – yeah. It’s just not my thing.

It is useful, though. At least, once I can stop myself from just setting everything to drums and mashing all the keys at once. That is fun. But… kind of useless. And the MIDI tenor sax isn’t entirely bad.

I’m wondering whether I have time to get just good enough on xaphoon to fake my way through a soprano sax solo. Should I try it? I don’t think I have enough time. But it might be fun to try.

Anna has all kinds of updates over on her blog – most relevantly to you the Bone Walker novel and soundtrack notes. We just had Shanti from Leannan Sidhe over doing some final chorus work. We are 98% done, less the readings.

You have no idea how excited about this album we are. You just don’t. I listen to these tracks and think ‘I can’t even believe this came out of my little studio, and I was there.’ Normally I’d be sitting here thinking ‘don’t oversell, don’t oversell,’ but I did not expect this album to turn into a serious business monster, and it has, and there’s just no way around that.

I have learned a lot since Dick Tracy Must Die, and it shows in every note and every beat. Goddamn I am excited about this. So is everyone who has heard it. You can still be one of these people – sign up for a review copy.

Readings get recorded in November. Mastering and replication follows in December. ARCs will go out then, too, and possibly (ahem) a limited/soft pre-release. Full official release January 2015.

Two and a half months. I swear, it’s gonna kill me. But seriously, I can’t wait.

Blue means finished, yellow means something reasonable is recorded, orange means fantasy, dreams, and laxness. Look at all that blue.

Why those colours – is it project management SCIENCE? …nooooooo those were just the colours of the little mini-post-it tabs they had at the store. *^_^*; BUT SO WHAT BLUE MEANS DONE OH GODS SO CLOSE. Just more vocals. And a couple of things not on this board like art and mastering and design and liner notes and how long can that take, right? Knock that out in an aftern… oh. SEE YOU IN 2015 EVERYBODY! Or something. XD