Fair question. Well, we came to a startling conclusion a couple of months ago: We’ve been trying to have our cake and eat it. As an unsigned band, you have a very finite amount of time in which to practice the set you’re going to play at your next gig, AND write some new songs which don’t suck turgid bullglans. We’ve probably been guilty in the past of slightly rushing new songs purely because we got excited and wanted to play them live as soon as possible.
This in turn meant that perhaps we weren’t totally happy with every aspect of the songs we’d written before we unleashed it on the public for the first time. There were moments onstage where we’d try something brand new that we were sure would be immense. Sometimes it was immense. Sometimes it fell flat and we took it back to the practice room. Most songs DID get finished… just not until we’d been playing them live for 3 months. Some have been quietly abandoned and put to pasture to be fattened up and eaten by ravenous song ravens.
We thought if we threw them some songs and then hid, they might leave us alone.
So we’ve decided for the next batch of songs, which will one day be an album, we’re not playing any of them live at all until they’re ready.
Yes, “Will one day be an Album”. We’re making an album. Captain Horizon are making an album. Right now.
We could have released the songs we’ve already got as an album. We love them and stand by them, but it doesn’t feel right – one of the things we enjoy about playing in our band is that we don’t think of ourselves as Rock, Metal, Indie, whatever… And the songs we’ve written up ‘til now have gone through different phases as we’ve worked out who we are as a band. We don’t think they’d make sense on the same CD.
So here’s what we’re doing…
The Album:
Josh (guitar/backing vocals) had a few days off work a while back. Some of us, handed a two week stretch without anything firm to do, would complain about the loss of earnings, lie in until past noon and then loop continuously between masturbation, console gaming and the eating of crisps. Perhaps we’d rediscover a level of alcohol intake physically impossible to the gainfully employed. Perhaps we’d start actually taking sides while watching Jeremy Kyle.
No reason for this photo, I just think it's fucking cool.
The J-man steered clear of these occupations, admirable though they may be: he started going through every song idea, riff or fragment of melody he could find among the hundreds he’d recorded on his mobile phones over the past 4 years. By the time he went back to work, he had thirty song ideas. We’ve been working on them for the last couple of months, building band arrangements, deciding which ones have legs, and trying to go somewhere new with our sound.
As I write this, we’ve got something like thirteen songs in the kind of condition where until recently, we’d have played them live. But we’re holding them close to our chest for now.
What are the new songs like? Well, they’re a bit more varied than we’ve done in the past. One or two are heavy enough to sink Kent. Some are pretty enough to move old men to tears. Some are a bit proggy. Some are sweet but simple. We’ll keep you updated on our progress as we go along!
Alex
Captain Horizon
