Lately I've spend my time doing mainly two things: writing lyrics and making preparations for concerts.
Let's start with the concerts: I will do small amount of live appearances later this year. Contracts are being negotiated, and I'll post the dates here as soon as they become available.
The lyric writing has once again prooved itself a hard task for me. When I figure out what the songs are about, the lyrics more or less write themselves. It's the finding out what it's about deal that's hard for me.
I had this song that I didn't know what was about, and I wrote a lot of crappy drafts that was going nowhere. It wasn't until I had help of an unexpected kind that I knew what it was about. I heard some really strange noises behind the ceiling in my studio, and only after a few days I realised, that a couple of jackdaws had moved in at the attic.

Jackdaws outside the studio

When I knew the song was about the eerie noises in my studio, the lyrics didn't take long to be written.
For the vocals I called my friend Anders. Anders and I first worked together fived years ago, when he sang three songs on my 'Constructions' album. Later I did some soundscapes for his band ZoBug.
Now we're working together again, and I'm very excited by what he's doing. Anders is among the most able musicians I know.


Anders doing vocals for 'The Jackdaw'

Anders is having fun with my main axe

Stina Madelaire joined me in the studio today, to do the vocals for two songs. This is the first time working with Stina since the music video shoot for Euphoria.
The first song we recorded is called 'The Museum' and required some eerie whispered vocals sung very close to the microphone:

Stina whispering vocals for 'The Museum'

'The Museum' is inspired by pictures of how the town of Chernobyl looks today. Very creepy indeed.
The second song we recorded is a much lighter piece called 'Daydream'. As you can see by Stina's waving arms, it is more lively.

Stina waving arms for 'Daydream'