What About Those Never-Ending Songs…

The creative motion resumed early in the afternoon. I had a good talk with Ben during my first walk-around session of the day. Ben is carrying a lot on his shoulders, so it’s important for me to make sure he feels supported in any possible way. And considering that he is pretty much like me on that matter, meaning that it’s all about the project and not about us, I know how good it is to realize that you are not alone in all that high-speed turmoil. I think, just like all of us, that he was a bit caught flat-footed regarding how everything unfolded yesterday. He felt like he was missing the beat and falling behind all day. “Welcome to my world brother”, I said laughing. I feel exactly the same ever since I opened my eyes after the surgery, to the point where I’m often wondering if it will be like that for the rest of my life. For having been the type of person who’s always on top of things, if not in advance, it’s not a puzzling sentiment… It’s a distressing and frightening one to be off-synch most of the time, which is another reason why I’m so grateful for Mikko’s presence. It feels good in my period of “recovery” to be able to lean on someone as intensely passionate as me, it brings peace to my current disorientation.
Speaking of which, Ben and I had a fantastic conversation with him this morning, about the meaning of the album, the themes and all. If we had already covered it all before, it was fantastic to dwell deeper into it as we are presently shaping the record’s entity, and since Mikko has a very sensitive approach to art, it’s inspiring for me to share that fundamental aspect of my creative universe over all the technicals we had to navigate through the day before. I could see that I wasn’t only welcomed but that it was sparking something within him as well. We talked about the essence of what I do, I opened up about my concern regarding shortening songs and all… Again, I felt received and wanted to offer him the same level of reciprocity when he explained the reason why he wanted us to go at the very heart of the songs as if I were looking to the invisible to find diamonds with him as the goldsmith master helping me polish the whole thing out of its unnecessary dirt. In our case, it means removing all the bits of over-production and all the pieces of unnatural perfection we are unconsciously bounding our songs with, as some smears and blurs might be too evident for us to even perceive them at this point, which makes it fascinating considering that it’s equally, human, machine, emotional, technical, spiritual and structural. Therefore, it’s no longer about restrictions, but complete liberation, everything is there to serve the song. My world suddenly expands in a very unpredictable matter, it’s quite mind-blowing, to be honest.

So the question is, can I share what’s on my heart and soul in a way that the songs have room to breathe on their own? That’s an interesting opportunity for me to be honest about it all because I’m not looking for artistic aesthetics, only genuine authenticity.