I no longer hear paintings
I never got around to sending out any kind of update last year. and now i have have realized that in 24 days this tiny letter service is going away. so better late than never until never is the only possibility.
whats up with that subject line. well over the past few years i've started to notice things changing about my perception and my source of inspiration. starting all the way back in 1999, working at the Albright-Knox art gallery as a security guard, i noticed that paintings would produce and inspire sound ideas in me. Rothko, Still, Monet, Balla. I would walk around and hear new ideas of sound that i would eventually explore at the end of that summer on my first 4-track recorder. That process, thinking about visual art and how it could become sound was my main focus of creativity for the next 20+years. It would slowly morph into sound as space or sound as a fluid wherein i would envision potential installations and performances. still inspired by visual art.
then lockdown happened, and i spent a lot of time thinking about why and how i would continue to create. what i began to notice was that the things that fueled my creativity didnt have the same impact. its not that i stopped enjoying visual art, i'll spend a whole day in a gallery easy and continue to travel to other cities just to visit galleries and museums. i began to think i just lost it. that i would no longer have any ideas or inspiration. but i started to reflect and realized that over the past few years a number of things about me have changed: cuts and bruises heal more slowly now, my cheeks are kinda droopy, what facial hair i can grow i see it more gray, my thoughts slower, my movements even less graceful then ever.
so why wouldn't my creative mind also change. i had spent some time and understood that i still had to create, that stopping was not an option. therefore, it meant i had to relearn and listen to what my creative brain wanted to use for inspiration. so that has been fun and has helped get me back into some kind of creative routine. its not been easy but i think my brain has decided that being easy is no fun.
enough of that.
you probably want to know i have new music. since Jan 2022 i have put up no less than like 7 new things on the ye olde bandcamp
"a plan for some time" https://cinchel.bandcamp.com/album/a-plan-for-some-time i cant believe i never wrote about this one for yall. i was honored that Trouble in Mind asked me to release a tape on their 'Explorers Series'. Similar to 'Disappear', it is mostly recorded in the first few months in the new studio and grapples with this return to finding something to make with guitars and piano.
"how will i know if this will make a memory" https://cinchel.bandcamp.com/album/how-will-i-know-this-will-make-a-memory track 1 is the live set from 'Weird Era @ The Cool Room' which is a wonderful little series my friend does at his house. tracks 2-4 are made from practice sessions for that show. all guitar based and very comfortable and cozy.
"already tired" https://cinchel.bandcamp.com/album/already-tired "meanwhile in waiting" https://cinchel.bandcamp.com/album/meanwhile-in-waiting "slowly toward disaster" https://cinchel.bandcamp.com/album/slowly-toward-disaster all 3 of these are more guitar and piano experiments that i was pretty happy with
"one day" https://cinchel.bandcamp.com/album/one-day this one is super special. its a document of the first proper collaboration for me post-lockdown. i was asked to play a show at tritriangle and i used it as an excuse to play with some of my favorite people tracks 1-5 where recorded on the one afternoon we practiced for the show. we met at my house and played through about 3 sets worth of music. neil brought his double bass and billie played violin. i recorded the entire afternoon just so that i could hear it back to get comfortable with group improv again. but listening back to the recording it sounded to good to not share. track 6 is the set we played later that week. i was really glad to play with them again. i hope to get more chances to do that soon.
"20240125" https://cinchel.bandcamp.com/album/20240125 last but not least are 2 pieces i recorded in one take directly to tape. solo guitar and then solo piano. it was a rough week but this was helpful.
thats all. thanks for reading and listening. maybe i will find another service like this to continue getting you very random updates. if not you can always find me on most social media places as cinchel
cinchel