Apologies for the lack of recent posts.  We've been heads down completing the 'Angelology' CD. 

This month, I've been introduced to the wonders of the mastering process.  Mastering is the final QA check in music production.  It involves a dedicated engineer with an excellent sound room with high quality speakers listening to the relative levels of the mix and ensuring everything is EQ'd for peak performance.

For the mastering process, we had the opportunity to work with world famous Abbey Road studios in London.  They have a top notch mastering facility which did an excellent job with 'Channel Cross' and 'Quickling.'  You can hear the end results of the mastered tracks on our MySpace page.

These two tracks have generated a considerable amount of interest in advance of the CD release.  They'll be featured on radio stations in the U.S. and the U.K. in coming months.  Our track 'Quickling' was recently featured on the Electrical Language podcast, based out of the UK.

In addition, I'm reworking the final mix of 'Aberfoyle' with Kim Carroll, a very talented Los Angeles (by way of Ireland) session player.  Kim's session and film work are outstanding and I'm delighted to have him put the final touches on 'Aberfoyle.'  This piece is a very atmospheric narrative and requires subtlety to approach which Kim brings in great measure.

Also featuring Kim's work in the hitherto unreleased title track to the 'Angelology' set.  This song presented a very challenging vocal which I puzzled over and struggled with for a number of weeks.  The final instrumentation was added by bassist Scratch Jenkins over the weekend.  It is currently being engineered by Jellyfish alum and mixing genius Chris Manning.

The final mix of 'Aur y El.' a pivotal track on the collection, was completed recently by Chris Manning, and is now on our MySpace page.  This song is an evocation dedicated to the arch angel commonly referred to in Western literature as 'Uriel.' 

Finally, I'm working on the cover art for the 'Angelology' album with a very talented San Francisco-based artist Bradley Platz.  Brad is working up an image that conveys the central them of the album taking into account the details of the various song lyrics. 

All said, it has been an enormously busy time.  I've had my arms full managing the various details of the final CD release.  I believe you'll all be delighted with the final outcome. 

Thank you all for your support and encouragement!

Mike - Gates of Light