I know that life seems to speed up as you get older - blink and another year is gone - but this is ridiculous. Rilicudicrous, as Punk Sanderson would say. Hurtling towards the end of January while trying to catch my breath.
But lots of excitements. In fact, in the next two months, there will be a whole series of excitements, which will, of course, in time-honoured fashion be announced first on these pages. I have been advised not to get ahead myself, so I shall behave. At least for a short while longer.
My days are torn between these moments - when you raise your head out of the trenches and plan for a better world - and the day-to-day onward march, which is currently the THRAK boxed set. In the can thus far, besides the album itself, are a stunning surround sound THRAKATTAK II (very different in feel to the first), and JURASSIC THRAK (or Keep that Dave), a making of disc somewhat akin to Keep That One Nick from the Larks boxset, but likewise very different from it. Which is, of course, why we all get out of bed in the morning. You set off on a new project and have no idea where it will end.
And so another day is done. I have the gruelling remainder of Claude Lanzmann’s holocaust documentary "Shoah" recorded on BBC four last night to watch. Enough to put anything I will ever experience into perspective. And make us realise that flippant metaphors of "trenches" or other wartime allusions are grossly misplaced.
PS. As a mastering engineer it is fascinating to read the various thoughts on the sound of the Orpheum - particularly as it shows how many people listen to music with their hifi’s already in strange settings. There is, of course, no right answer. Music can be delicate and music can hit you over the head. When compiling BBOOM, RF asked why bootlegs were often more exciting than proper releases. And the answer is absurd amounts of compression. Hence the brickwall limiting on that album, which deliberately mimicked a bootleg (and which conveniently cures some of the defects of the live mixing). The same approach has been used on most of the board recordings in the various 1970s boxed sets. The Orpheum takes the alternative approach. There is also the question of what, in a live context, is a "good mix" - Brian May used to say that the secret to an exciting live recording is that something should be too loud ie. that a well-mixed live show is not the same as a studio recording. Again, the Orpheum, rightly in my opinion, takes the alternative approach. Vive la difference.
"The question is its answer."
