TBD
New Jersey, USA
Check Out the Album
Original Concept:
This year, i actually put my album concept up to a vote! Folks who supported a crowdfunding campaign in which i was involved selected from a list of 8 nominees (some of which are pretty wacky, and almost all of which were submitted by one of them).
The winning concept, submitted by long-time supporter Jeff Elbel, read as follows:
"10 songs each somehow based upon, related to, influenced by, explaining, or spinning off from a character found in (artwork or lyrics from) one Rush album. The list of albums must include Rush, 2112, Moving Pictures, and Clockwork Angels."
The victory was by a narrow margin (1 vote of 22 cast plus 4 abstentions), with the runners up being tied between an album of songs about how other songs could've been better (submitted by Dave Morris) and a concept described simply as "Girls, Cars, and Surfing" (also submitted by Jeff Elbel). Thanks also to Jason Larke for submitting a great concept nominee.
Artist Post-Game:
I was honestly on fence about whether i should call this year's record a WINNER or a PARTIAL, but because i didn't fully complete what i set out to do, i feel like it's more fair to fall back to the latter.
In terms of the challenge, i did successfully write and record the 10 songs as stipulated by Jeff Elbel's winning concept submission. In terms of the created material, i successfully met the Rules of 40, 30, 20, and 10, as well, and did so by approximately 2152 EDT on 31 March, before the challenge deadline.
Unfortunately, just after the Equinox, my work was set back by (what is best described as) a very sudden death in the family, and the resulting hit to my production schedule wasn't fully recoverable. While i was able to record my material on time and even get some rough mixes by ~0115 EDT on 01 April (which, given the EST-to-EDT conversion mid-month, is technically only 15 minutes late, for which i'd normally just call Rule of 0), i did not at all have time to correctly mix the album. In the past, i've called albums "done" prior to being mastered, but they've always at least gotten to final (enough) mix. This one definitely isn't final in that regard, so i can't call it really "done" until it's properly mixed. I suppose one could claim that my rough-mix drop of the record is technically a complete "version" of the album, which is why i say i could theoretically call this a WINNER. ... but in the end, it doesn't really matter.
What matters is that -- despite a very difficult ending to the month -- i wrote and minimally rendered a record with which i'm very happy in terms of capturing my vision. As usual, many performances could've been better and all that, but i'm extremely pleased with how the composition and writing turned out. Jeff's concept was incredibly fun to work with, and inspired a wide variety of fun (at least for me) pieces, including some in genres that i might call sloppy jazz, early-70s rock, punkadilly, tribute filk, and pseudo-world minimalist trance-funk-scat. As is often the case with my InCoAlMo records, i found the ideas and creative process inspired by the concept to be very rewarding, and feel that with more serious production, this could be an album i'd be very happy to promote. I'm hoping that, since i can take more time with final mixing this year, i might get closer than ever to a "serious" final product (at the cost, of course, of my first-ever InCoAlMo without a WINNER on the record books). Ç'est la vie. :)
*** UPDATE 2024 ***
It took awhile, but i eventually decided that i really liked the material on this album, and that it'd be worth having it professionally mixed and mastered. We worked this up for a release in early 2024, and i really ended up with a much better record than i could've hoped for on my own. The full story is in the "liner notes" on Bandcamp (link above), but in short, i'm very happy and grateful for this record and for the unique challenge that inspired it!