Angel Frequency

I’m at work on the new album, little sweetheart. Basic tracks - for 23 songs - are completed and I’m recording bass, percussion, backing vocals and other parts now.

One of the new tracks I’m most excited about has you, of course, at its center. A sound college of your spoken word envelopes the piece and dancing around and underneath are loops of found sound and low droning vocals and… our first use of synth on a track.

When I first got home from the hospital, I wasn’t at all sure I’d be able to play guitar or bass for some time. Ortho initially told me August and this was in May. I did find a way to play while seated even with such limited range of motion in my broken shoulder but I got a couple of new instruments I thought I might be able to play and compose with with just one hand if need be. One of them was a keyboard. I thought it would be just an inexpensive little practice one but it turned out to be really good. It reminds me of the Privia you started writing on our last Christmas together. But what’s best about it is that it has a couple hundred different settings and among them are some very good sounding organ and synth ones. They have infinite sustain and even start folding back, resonating overtones to the brink of feedback if you keep them going.

I’ve been listening almost non-stop to ambient music this year, little sweetheart, especially that Austin duo we like Stars of the Lid. The new track is called “Angel Frequency” and it invokes both the celestial presence that I find visiting me when I feel or sense you near, as well as the experience I had in those ten minutes when my heart stopped in the hospital. This track feels like the very centerpiece of the new album and a signal as to where the band, with your ethereal guidance, is headed.

I’m so heartened and excited by the prospect, little sweetheart. Please remain near me, won’t you? Don’t go too far away. I’m listening carefully. With all my love forever.