Insomnic Hallucinations (intro)
KeithHandy posted in Composing, Old skool, Producing on May 3rd, 2006
Keeping in line with my earlier promise to provide the “essentials”, here is the first piece of the puzzle: the first half of Insomnic Hallucinations.
Fun facts about this song:
- I still have my first cassette demo, recorded in 1985 using a cheap keyboard, ping-ponged between a pair of boomboxes, with drum and bass parts done entirely by mouth. The pseudo-piano chords you hear at the beginning are ripped directly off that cassette, as a sort of umbilical cord across time.
- The other synthesizers in the intro are also from an early cassette recording, this time a shorter instrumental version for submission to a contest in a magazine.
- The bulk of this version was recorded in 1996 with an ambi-directional rhythm track; the outro (not included here) uses the same basic tracks as the main part here, only reversed. The backwards guitar you can hear in the background is actually the end solo, and likewise what you hear in the foreground now becomes the backwards stuff in the background then.
- The vocals were re-recorded only a couple of weekends ago, the lyrics having been altered from the original with the help of a text-mangling irc bot affectionately known as Hal Whippy.
- I’ve never been able to find “insomnic” in any dictionary. It’s supposed to be an adjective. The hallucinations are induced by insomnia. Or maybe the hallucinations themselves are suffering from insomnia — all the better.
The mp3 linked to here has not yet been subjected to the car test, so it may undergo some minor tweaking, and may be replaced without notice. Keep checking in for more goodies from my “essentials” list, and I will try to keep the gaps between releases as short as possible.
May 6th, 2006 at 9:57 am
Hey Keith. I’ve always been a fan of this one… do you plan on releasing the other half? It’s funny that you mention the “insomnic” dictionary problem, as I have this argument with a friend who is an insomniac. I refer to him having an insomnic night and he’ll tell me that the word doesn’t exist, and then I tell him that maybe if he worried less about these sorts of things he might sleep better.
May 6th, 2006 at 1:06 pm
Jeremy: at the very least I will put up the last verse going into the last guitar solo, but I think the stuff in the middle has always been sketchy, non-essential, and not ready for prime time. I may use the opening and closing of IH as bookends for an “essentials” album and try to put it out via Magnatune or something, so I want to keep the focus on stronger bits.
As for “insomnic”, Shakespeare contributed hundreds of previously non-existent words to the English language, so I should be entitled to my one. Glad to hear you’re forcing it on people. :)