Everything old is new again
posted on 28 Jun 2007 under category History
One of the most natural reactions for people to life in general is to wish to go back, ‘knowing what I know now’. Even when something is good, in hindsight people will ruminate on their memories and think “oh, man, I should have said/done X instead…”. Sometimes, that’s clearly impossible - you can’t go back and relive the social hell of High School (the ‘best’ you can do is go to the silly reunions and tell everyone what you really thought of them, but even that is cold comfort. Some scars just run too deep, but that’s not a subject for this blog…). Other times, though, especially when it comes to creative arts, you CAN go back and do it over again.
The question, then, becomes whether or not you should. Or, rather, “Why? What’s the point?” With regards to the older Rampage material that Aerik and I have reinterpreted over the past couple of years, that’s never really been an issue. If you’ve read my blog, you know that I’ve never thought of myself as a great vocalist, and that I was learning as I went on the technical aspects of recording at home on PC. Sometimes the enthusiasm of having something even marginally bigger than those old boombox tapes was enough, and it was only in retrospect that I noticed “wow, those guitars sound really lame - and where’s the bass?”, or “shit, I really blew THAT note…”. Other times, it was an acknowledged compromise because of technological limitations, like the fact that everything pre-Monolith was recorded at 22.05 KHz instead of 44.1, or the drums were mono on This End Up and Misogyny.
Of course, I’m still learning, but it’s the kind of learning that builds upon a well-grounded basis in experience. It’s less haphazard, though I can still surprise myself - or, rather, stumble into something technologically that works way better than I thought it would. Anyway, I’m comfortable enough with the technical process that it has really allowed me to go back and re-do some of those old songs with these new tricks. However, rather than just showcasing the new studio, I’ve tried hard to keep to the basic feel and ideas and emotions from the songs - and judging from what people have said to me about the later Rampage material, it seems to be working.
But re-doing an entire album, one that I myself have said was one of the most important albums to me in my entire body of work? One that seems to have been very well-received? Could Aerik and I pull it off?
Time will tell on that one, I suppose, but in the meantime I’ll talk about some of what’s different, what’s the same, and what I’ve noticed about the songs and myself as I brought them to life again.
(Again, a snapshot, but this time a snapshot of my mindset and approach, rather than just a nuts-n-bolts description of what I was doing. It’s gratifying that, even after all this time and all of these setbacks, both voluntary on my part and circumstantial, that I still largely hold to the ideas and values I have here. I’ll find a way back to voicing myself musically, knowing that under all of the inertia and intrusion of life that I’m still in the same basic headspace.)