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Welcome back, everyone. I realize it’s been quite awhile since the last update but things have been a little hectic since the release of Evolve. There have been shows and writing of new material, as well as some major life events that have kept all of us busy in the months since the release of the album. Where to start…

I guess for starters I’ll update on all of the remixes that have been flooding in… We have just about all of the mixes that we’re lookig for for this batch of songs and some of these are really killing it and getting some good exposure. Most recently, the remix that Lthrboots did for our track Less Than Zero was played by none other than Grammy winner David Guetta. Networking is a beautiful thing, I have been saying this for years, but no truer words have been spoken… this serves as a prime example of just that. We have been getting some incredible re-works of these tracks, which will all be published this year at some point. We’re playing with a few different ideas as far as how to release them… deciding to either release strictly a remix album, or if we would rather release a remastered special edition of Evolve, in a two disc format with the best of these remixes with some previously unreleased tracks. We have three songs that were recorded during the Evolve sessions that didn’t make the album, as well as an alternate version of a track that did appear on Evolve that would be on there. I don’t want to give too much away right now, but I’m super excited about it and can’t wait for everyone to hear it because it’s something that I’ve not heard anyone in our genre do quite yet.

Now, as far as the new material is concerned, we have actually been writing material for the new album already, which is a little crazy but inspiration comes at strange times and this was just one of those. I thought we were around five or six, but last weekend I actually went through my hard drive and found that we’re already looking at about ten tracks that have been programmed. We’re working on a new cover song to use for live shows so we can retire Damaged, as great a cover as it is. I can say, however, that there won’t be a cover on the new album, but only because it won’t really fit with the overall theme that we’re going for.

I have always wanted to write a concept album, and feel that there has been no better time than right now. The name for the album is tentatively entitled “Get Through This”, and without giving too much away, will be focused on a very major life event that happened to me just two short months ago. Ronay had the idea and it was this great epiphany that this is what it should be about. I feel like this will work on a few levels and will be a very interesting album for the listener to experience. Writing a concept album is a whole new process for me as well, because always before I just programmed whatever I felt like programming and then just arranged the tracks in the order that best made sense. Recording a concept album, however, doesn’t allow you to do that so easily because now I have to keep in mind where I am in this story I’m working with, which adds this whole other element… I like this challenge though. Strangely enough, I’ve kinda programmed the beginning and end, it’s the middle probably four or five tracks that I am going to have to trudge through, which will no doubt prove to be incredibly taxing but also very therapeutic. More details on that to come.

This year is shaping up to be very eventful. Our first out of state show is this May when we play another WTII Records showcase, this time in Milwaukee for the Dead on TV album release show with The Drowning Season. We have a few other unconfirmed shows that we’re working on, which will also be pretty exciting to announce. These shows, coupled with the progress on the new album and one more bit of exciting news that I am hoping to have more information on in a few months, are no doubt keeping us busy. Thanks to everyone that picked up a copy of Evolve, that came out to support us at the album release show last October at Darkroom, and those that came out most recently to support us at Cobra Lounge for our 2012 live debut… we may not be playing as many shows quite yet this year, but make no mistake… there are big things in the works and before this year is over, you’ll be seeing us like you have never before.

-B.

As some of you may be aware, I (Brandon) am an amateur filmmaker. A few of my films have shown in some festivals and a few have actually won (none have placed below third). I had the idea to film all of our studio sessions to make a short making-of video montage similar to the one I compiled for our video for “Until the End of the World”, which featured some of our footage shot during the recording of our “New Skin” EP last year. As a fan of documentary films, I’ve also been trying to brainstorm to come up with a subject to film for my own because I’ve yet to film something in this genre. Finally, the idea came to me, why the hell not just put one together for the band? This is where you come in. I have hours of studio footage so far, but what I’m looking for now is just some various (as many as possible) clips of people either talking about our music, their thoughts on the band, anything about the members they want to say just in general, or what genre of music they would consider us (I feel like this could be a pretty funny segment watching people try and decide what category we fit in). I feel like in this day and age with webcams, cheap video cameras, even cell phone cameras, that people can film whatever they want to say and email them to the band for us to use.

This is your time to shine! I will take all of the compiled footage and put it together with the studio footage and some band member interviews to create a short (under an hour) documentary about the literal evolution of this band. So help us out! Feel free to email me if you would like more information or specific questions to answer, at evlved@gmail.com. It would be nice to get some of these vids from other bands, possibly that we’ve played with before or ones that we’ve remixed for or have remixed for us. I know I’m getting a clip from Tara of TaraTaintonXXX.com, as we provide music for a number of her clips. This is your chance to tell your friends that you were featured in a film with a porn star!

Well we’re just under two weeks now until we get back in to Minbal Studios to finish the recording phase for Evolve. These tracks are coming along incredibly well and quite literally evolving each time we rehearse them. Recently we were able to run through new songs Lust, Living for Hope (unofficial title), and title track Evolve. This was the first time running through these three with vocals and guitar and with those two added elements, they came to life like none of us expected them to. Personally, I’m most excited about the way Evolve (the song) is sounding and I really feel like this song is the equivalent of what New Skin was for the first EP a year ago… maybe it’s a thing with title tracks for us… which is very cool too because this track just kinda happened and really wasn’t planned for the album but could end up being the strongest track on it. Ronay is most excited about Living for Hope, which is another epic track that is no doubt one of the strongest.

We’re left now with one, possibly two more rehearsals before we actually hit Minbal to wrap this all up. Next weekend will mark the first runs with vocals for a few more new tracks and then it’ll be time to put on the game face and finish this beast of an album. I’ve never been more excited or proud of anything musically as I am with this album and this band. Once we finish up recording we’ll be ready for a new photoshoot, for which we already have an amazing photographer to handle and some good leads for locations and then who knows what else… oh, I do… the first SS video.

…and we went the other direction. I posted a question through the SS Facebook page, asking if 14 tracks were too many for a debut album. I was actually pleased to see the number of “no” votes we got, and I appreciate both the confidence in us to accomplish such a task, as well as the desire to hear as much new material as possible. Unfortunately though, due mostly to time constraints, we are going to leave two tracks behind for Evolve. We actually didn’t anticipate having a title track on the album but I got inspired last week and ran with an idea and it just kinda happened. We all dig it so much that we really don’t want to leave this one off, so we’ve decided to cut a couple of the songs we had originally planned to record July 8-10.

Which ones are actually being cut? We’re leaving off “Life v.0″ and “Fifteen Years”. This means that Evolve will still feature the first track that Joel and I collaborated on, the instrumental “Scraps.” I thought about cutting it since there are no vocals, but really it has sort of a special place with the band because it really does kinda signify the beginning of the growth of the band from my solo project to a fully staffed band.

We also chose not to cut “Less Than Zero”, our Peter Steele tribute track because of obvious reasons. The song “With Hope to Guide Us” has been renamed to “Hope is All You’re Living For” because lyrically it took a dark turn and the original title sounded too uplifting… can’t have any of that nonsense.

So there you have it… thanks for the votes but there just aren’t enough hours in a day. This just means that we’ve already got a jump on an EP or the next full-length. This also doesn’t mean that the songs cut won’t make their way into our live shows… gotta keep things interesting.

Those of you that haven’t been following my incessant complaining posts on Facebook… I’ve spent most of this week sick as a motherfucker. I’ve not felt well since Monday and I’m blaming Chuck from Violent Messiah for passing along some super-flu bullshit… that’s the last time I make-out with someone in a dark bar. Strangely enough though, this week has been a very productive one all the same. As you may have read in the last post, the lyrics for With Hope are now finished (although the song title might change to match the lyrics a little better)… lyrics have always been my achilles heel. I hate writing them, I hate thinking about them, and I always hate the finished result no matter what anyone else says. These, however, are the exception and I feel are probably the strongest I’ve written so far.

This week also included some edits to the programming for the new song “Lust”, taking it from one of my least favorite new tracks to one of my most favorite ones. Real exciting stuff there, can’t wait to share that one. But even more exciting than that, I finished programming a completely new track yesterday morning… and this one we’re going to really push to get on the album. I like it so much that maybe we’ll consider swapping out one of the other tracks for it so we have enough time/energy to get it ready. I don’t know yet, we’ll see how it goes. If we just add it to the album though, that means we’ll be looking at a 14 track album, and that seems a little absurd… especially considering that our shorter tracks generally clock-in right around the 6 minute mark. This could present a problem in actually having room on the disc for them all… creating the possibility of a possible double album, but the idea of that makes me both excited and nauseous, as that is a fuck-ton more work and extra headaches… but could be worth it in the end. Who knows… something to think about as the remixes keep trickling in.

Surprisingly enough, the lyrics for With Hope to Guide Us are now finished. This song is our most cinematic yet and I wanted to really capture the feel of the music with the lyrics so this one has been the most difficult to write… but surprisingly enough they kinda wrote themselves. A few days ago I felt inspired enough to scribble down some words. I had this one line in my brain that just would not quit repeating so I wrote it down and ran with it. The lyrics sat there for a few days but this afternoon I went over them and it just hit me like a ton of bricks… these are the lyrics for With Hope… it couldn’t be more obvious.

So there’s another in the can. Ronay and I will be going over these in the next few days to tweak any phrases that might need to fit a bit better, but should be good to go. That means just a few left to finalize before July 10th, when the last of the vocals for Evolve will be recorded. This album is going to crush.

Note: We also hinted on this in a FB post earlier today, but we confirmed yesterday a show that will be our biggest yet as a band. I’ll post more information on this when I’m told I can do so, but we couldn’t possibly be more excited about this one and might end up using it as an album release show for us.

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