A visit to London has been a long time coming. Some of the most inspirational music for me has come out of this city.
Heathrow Airport.
First weekend I was there I crashed with Za and his family. They took good care of me, letting me drink copious amounts of tea, and giving me slippers to wear around the house. Like royalty, I tell you.
Za manages a record label called Fent Plates which has released "Turn to Salt" and my From Your Window EP. This was my first time meeting him in person after only knowing each other over the internet for years.
Considering Fent Plates is across an ocean from me, I never had the chance to actually go where my records are stored and ship one off myself, so Za let me package my own vinyl, which felt pretty neat.
Later that same evening, Za and I met fellow Fent Plates artist, Kaido, and they both showed me around the area. This was my first encounter with the mythical Red Phone Booth.
Za, demonstrating unprecedented dabbing prowess.
Kaido, inspecting the details.
After that weekend, I went into southeast London to stay with Jake, whose music goes under Vacant.
Jake and I have been keeping up with each others music for a few years, and over an exchange on Twitter, he agreed to help produce the track for "March."
Shortcut to Tesco, through the park.
One day, we woke up a bit early to go visit Jake's brother who knew a few cool spots to record sound.
After taking the underground, and crossing a few backstreets, we arrived at the apartment.
First place we went was an underground tunnel, right underneath the roads themselves. The feeling walking through the dark, humid tunnel was quite ominous, and you could even feel the breeze and vibrations as the subway passed nearby.
My camera isn't very good in low light, so I didn't get many good pictures, unfortunately, but truly, we got to explore something that seemed long forgotten.
After, we recorded sounds in a tiny underground parking deck. The reverb was incredibly thick; you could hear every footstep and every shift in movement, since every surface in there reflected sound.
I was going to use the shots of us recording in the parking deck in the video for March, but I felt that it was too bulky for the video, but you can definitely hear the sounds in the percussion.
The day after, we took a break from recording to see some sights.
Me chillin' next to Big Ben.
Watching London illuminate as night crept in was my favorite.
A few days before my flight home, Jake and I made an impromptu trip to Bristol to visit Joe, whose musical moniker is Sorrow.
Bus to Bristol.
After meeting Joe in downtown Bristol, we took a train back to his home studio.
Some back story to Joe: his music caused a profound shift in me years back. I could get sappier, but the short of it is that his music showed me how much depth can go into electronic tunes. Needless to say, it was an honor being in that studio.
"Yeah, how did you make that sound again?"
Jake and I couldn't sleep that night, so we walked down to the pier.
We took off soon after waking up the next day.
Once back in London, Jake and I finished up writing "March" with an evening to spare. I honestly don't know how we did it. I decided to get one last view of the London skyline.
And yeah, I don't really know how to end this. I flew home, spent the next week editing the video & mixing the song. You can pretty much see all the other details I didn't write about in the video. Hope you like it.
As always, thanks for reading/listening/watching.
Until next time,
~Feverkin