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This project came out of my need to relax, to find a way not to think about the things that stress me out.
For a while now I've been trying to make music that's more and more minimalistic in some of my other projects.
It came to a head one day when I was particularly stressed out, I was having a really rough day.
I decided to plug in my guitar and make some music, and after 20 minutes I'd recorded the first ghost harmonics track.
And I was happy and relaxed.
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Generally I'm lying on the couch with my guitar in low light or darkness. It's a really comfortable and relaxed atmosphere from the start.
I play a note on the guitar with the EBO and I just stay on that note.
You start to hear all the harmonics in that note that would otherwise be hidden in the background.
All the elements that give that note a really rich sound.
Sometimes the harmonics come to the foreground or pulse and drift in the music.
It's quite amazing the range of sounds you can get from this and how much you can express.
You'd think all these albums would sound the same, but to me at least they capture a different mood.
Some are somber, some dramatic, some mesmerising and chilled out.
And I mean mesmerising afterwards, I'm always in the days.
I'm very relaxed and my vision is hazy.
Most of this music is played on my 8 string guitar with an EBO.
The 8 string gives you a wide range of notes to play with.
It's like having a guitar and a bass all in one instrument.
And for those who don't know, an EBO is an electronic bow.
It's basically like having a violin bow that just keeps going and you can create really interesting sounds with it.
All of this goes for a few virtual pedals in the laptop.
Slightly different ones every time, but can include octave, flanger, chorus, always lots of echo and tons of reverb.
All of this goes into a pretty long loop.
It forces me to take my time, to take easy and not do too much.
Urban ambient is exactly what this is.
It's deeply ambient, it's slow and drifting.
It's not quite dark ambient.
My music is not intentionally dark, but it's also not clean and wishy-washy like some New Age music.
It's somewhere in between.
It's chilled out, but it's gritty.
It's big and noisy, but at the same time lush and epic.
I live by a motorway in the centre of a very busy cosmopolitan city.
That, above all else, is what influences my music.
But I'm also surrounded by trees, so I've got a little kind of noisy green oasis in the city here.
There are sounds here that, while harsh to some, become commonplace and soothing once you've been here for a while.
The constant sound of the traffic on the motorway, for example, it's like waves rolling on the seashore almost.
And in fact, when it's quiet here, I have trouble sleeping.
I try to capture that mix of nature and busy city and the album covers as well as the music, too.
There'll be more albums, of course, but I also plan to take this project on the road and play live.
It's going to be an interesting experience, actually.
We're going to need audiences who are patient and actually prepared to listen.
I do wonder, though, how many people will stay to the end of an hour of me almost completely motionless,
quite possibly in almost darkness, essentially just playing one note.
For those who do stay, I think it will be a unique and hopefully rewarding experience.
I'm really looking forward to it.
Thank you.
