"easy pop gift" - daniel prendiville

"Easy Pop Gift"?

What was meant to be a quickie release ended-up taking over a year to record, mix and release. We won't bore you with all the things that went wrong in the recording and release process, but here are some of the...er...highlights:-

• The EP was supposed to featured seven tracks, but computer problems, plus the march of time, meant that three of the tracks had to be dropped;

• regular computer crashes lead to many of the individual *.wav files being corrupted. The mix of "Belly Up" on the CD was the last complete mix of the track before some key files "went south";

• "Belly Up" is a particularly accursed track. Just days before the CD was due to be released, the final mix of all the tracks mysteriously disappeared from the computer. It was possible to do new mixes of three of the tracks, but all that could be done for "Belly Up" was to work off the *.mp3 file of the deleted final mix;

• at various stages in the recording process, there were "issues" in relation to the tuning of the guitars used on the sessions. Some creative EQ-ing took care of most of these problems, but there were days when a lump-hammer might justifiably have been taken to the guitars;

• not entirely related to the recording process, but the significant illness of one family member and the death of another required a certain element of re-focusing of one's attention

• the design of the sleeve for the CD was delayed due to the loss (this is so embarrassing, really...) of a camera tripod quick-release plate in the toilet of an aquarium outside Edinburgh.

OK, enough belly-aching. The title, "Easy Pop Gift", is inspired by the wonderful Bryan Baker, of  Gajoob fame. What you get on the EP are two punky tracks, "Johnny Sportscar" and "Belly Up", one 60's style pop song, "Uncle Quentin" and the final track, "Ice Station Deborah", which we can cheerfully describe as "bad Duran Duran"...:-)

After all the effort, we hope you enjoy the EP.

We're now off to de-frag the hard disks, and then we're going to sit in a dark room with a damp towel over our heads. We may be gone a long time...

(c) 2002 Daniel Prendiville

Johnny Sportscar - Uncle Quentin - Belly Up - Ice Station Deborah