Final Cover for Uncle Raven’s Super Happy Funtime Carnival

We are back home.  We are mixing everything. We are close to a completed project. And now, we have our final cover by the always wonderful Sarah DeBuck.

I even have completed tracks i could post online, but… spoilers. Tomorrow we will discuss a few folks getting a free advance preview.

 

Rough Sketches For The Carnival Cover

Hi ho. I’ve finished recording everybody and i’m set to head home to start mixing and hemming and hawing.  In the meantime, Sarah De Buck has sent me some rough sketches for cover art to peruse, which i thought i’d share. My personal taste is for this first one, with some small changes of course.

 

Recording Eimear O’Riordon

Recording has been going splendidly. Rhys Owen was excellent as usual and yesterday we recorded Eimear O’Riordan, who is singing the Tunnel Girl songs, and she was utterly stellar. I almost cried during her 2nd take of the 2nd song. Really excellent stuff. 

 

Off To London

 

The Room Beneath New Albion

“Last night my love, we shared a kiss. Twas ne’er a moment quite like this. You and me and me and you, i know together we’ll be soon. I’ll graduate top of my class, you’ll be mine and i, your lass. I know the future will be bright, for such a kiss we shared last night.” -poetry by Annabel

I am leaving for London tomorrow to record vocalists for the upcoming album Uncle Raven’s Super Happy Funtime Carnival; The Ballad Of Lost Hollow Act 2. Or , you know, just the Carnival. I

have already left my home to travel to the big city here where i will catch my plane. I will update as i go, but over the next week i will record 3 vocalists: Rhys Owen (for Henry), Eimear O’Riordan for Tunnel Girl, and the big one, Aidan Bell for Raven. Psyche Corp has already finished Han Mi vocals and Lauren Osborn is in the midst of completing her vocals for both Helen and the Floozies. Once this is done i will return home, mix all the vocals and then that’s it, folks. The album is done and ready.

So, a discussion has come up several times in terms of continuity and understanding what happened at the end of the 1st Act of Lost Hallow (Miss Helen’s Weird West Cabaret). The New Albion trilogy, that is the Steampunk Opera, Dieselpunk Opera, and Atompunk Opera has a shorter length epilogue: The Room Beneath New Albion. The Room Beneath New Albion is the continuation of the story and it is from its ending that most fans understand what the Voice at the end of the Cabaret is all about.

So, for those who aren’t as aware of Room as they are of the proper trilogy, i’m posting the album here to listen to. It also has some fun bits like seeing who Annabel was in the reincarnation before she was Annabel, as well as the very first reincarnation of the Savior Soul (Priscilla/Constance/Rachael). Also, as the very last work in the trilogy, it marked a milestone for me and the Coal That Sings Hosanna is not just Alice, but me pouring my personal feelings on having completed the New Albion Trilogy. You do get that Alice building the room is me making the New Albion albums, right?

So, here it is, give it listen, free of charge, The Room Beneath New Albion:

“Last night it was, we shared a kiss. There weren’t no moment quite like this. Me and you and you and me, if things were fair that’s how it’d be. But life is shit and blood and death, with moments rare of beauty’s breath. But still, that i’ve known one thing bright, for such a kiss we shared last night.” – poetry by Alexander

 

A Few Notes On The Upcoming Carnival Album

art by eWKn at deviantart: http://ewkn.deviantart.com/art/Carnival-254945801

• It will be released in early July.
• Of course close to the ending there will be a suicide. I mean, that’s a no brainer.  I have been struggling with the concept ever since one of my closest friends on this earth hung himself. Damn straight there’s gonna be a suicide. This is not, however, a spoiler. It is a strategic teaser.
• This will not make sense right now. Just file it for later after you’re heard the album: It’s not genetic. There’s no inheritance involved. Don’t bother going down that route. It’s not genetic so don’t start trying to figure out lineages and all that.
• I will be heading to England in two weeks to record most of the vocalists. Since i’m not sure how i’m going to… actually survive in England for 5 days, let me throw out there that if you’ve been thinking of purchasing one of my albums, now would be a GREAT time to do so. Haven’t picked up Lost Hallow Act 1 yet? Well, Act 2 is almost out, no time like the present! Maybe you’re a big fan, you listen to Dolls or one of the other New Albion operas all the time, but you’ve never actually bought it… hey, no judgment, we’re all poor here… but you’ve been meaning to. Well i’m just letting you know that Now=A Really Really Good Time.

  https://mochalab.bandcamp.com/

• So, a little while after the Carnival, before the 3rd and final Act, i will release a little EP album. Nothing too long and it will be instrumental. It will cover the next event directly after the end of Act 2, but since it has no vocals or anything, it’s not necessary to the plot or anything. I want to make a post rock kind of psychill thing, and it fits in nicely at this point. It is not for everybody, so you don’t need to have it, it’s more an appendix kind of thing. The few of you who would appreciate this kind of thing will dig it.
• Act 3 will wrap Lost Hallow up. By the end of Act 2 you should have a pretty solid idea of the major plot pieces in play, even if most of the details are missing.
• After THAT, i will do an album of short stories in the same vein as the Fairy Tale albums, which frankly, i love and am as proud of as the New Albion operas. This album will feature stories from across the New Albion timeline. By the time Lost Hollow ends, we will have covered a significant amount of time from when Dolls Of New Albion first started. There are lots of little stories possible from all sorts of parts and places in the timeline and mythos. Whether they will have a connecting thread like Fairy Tales For Homeless Faeries or not, i have no idea. But it won’t be a linear story. It will definitely be a bunch of short story songs.
• Which then brings up the question: Is this the point when we do the Space Opera? Are we far enough along in the New Albion timeline to begin the Space Opera? Possibly. Certain things occurring in The Ballad of Lost Hallow will factor into the Space Opera. But the entire New Albion timeline will lead to a Space Opera series. Maybe then will be the time.

 

 

 

 

Jack Of Ash Animation by Jessie Berliner

Jessie Berliner, an Animation/Drama/Music student at Bennington College has made this wonderful animation for Jack Of Ash from Fairy Tales for the Lost and Wandering.

“For my senior work in animation I knew I wanted to work with a song that told a story, preferable a fairy tale. I’ve always had a love for folk tales, not the new, sugar-coated stories, but the original, darker, tales. I’ve been a fan of Paul Shapera’s music for a while, and when I remembered that he had a couple of albums with the kind of song I was looking for, I went investigating. Re-discovering Jack of Ash was a stroke of luck, and I’m so thankful that he let me use it for this project.

I was captured by the haunting grace of the story, and the instrumentals inspired me as a dancer and (sometimes) choreographer. During the development of this animation I went through so many possible interpretations and variations, and while I could only fully realize one, I like to think that all that thought comes across in the nuances of the work you see before you.”

Jack of Ash from Ayelet Leah on Vimeo.