My new album is now out on Audiobulb!
This is a digital download only release, no CD or vinyl formats. The
release page has links to purchase and download the album, as well as a short interview about my process and thoughts on the album.
The reviews have been strange, there seem to be people that like it a lot and people who don't like it at all.
I was surprised and flattered to have a blurb show up in Vital Weekly's email, where they call it "a beautiful work that combines gentle musical tones with demanding approaches to electronic sound art."
Lend Me Your Ears
featured the album with another interview and some links to other netlabel tracks I've done, including a free download from Supple. Thanks to Julian for including this!
The critics who didn't like it so much made some interesting assumptions about my influence and approach, and questioned the validity of the music. The music gets compared (even with my other music!) instead of standing on its own, though perhaps their take is that it isn't worth writing about if it isn't compared with something familiar, or perhaps I am too poorly fulfilling their expectations of what electronic music should evoke.
On the other hand, my hard work must be worth something if they've even bothered to listen, so while I can't say I'm very happy with the criticism, I feel strengthened by the real fans of the music that like it with such enthusiasm and dedication that I can't help but think I'm doing something right.
I do feel like I work in many forms. Listen to the free netlabel releases I have online and you'll notice similarities, but they are largely different in several ways. I don't feel like Supple is carrying a lot of the same approaches some of these other albums involve, to me it's an entirely different artistic work, not just another album to put out the same sounding music that I know will work because people say it's the one they like.
I'm not even sure how to write music this way. The tracks I know people dig came from creative places I am unsure how to find, but in the process of music making and improvisation I am confident it gets found... the problem is that I don't know how. I never quite feel like I'm DOING anything, it's more like I am constantly searching for what goes together in my ear, and try to temper it with ego-dissolving indeterminate abstraction and raw expression.
I guess in the end it's just really how you listen to things.