New Album Update, Work In Progress Artwork, Blobs of Glue!

Hi Everyone! 

Just wanted to give you a little update on the new album. But first! here's a picture of a proof from the Carpal Tunnel Syndrome cover from decades ago! Back in the age of the compact disc! Remember those?? When the pressing plant packages your CDs or vinyl, they send you these proofs before your disc goes into production. Essentially it's a big sheet with a few unassembled CD or LP covers on it. It's your final chance to check for printing errors before they start the manufacturing run.

For those of you who have this CD, you may have noticed I had written the word "glue" with a few arrows pointing to the corners...

Before they sent the proof the manufacturing plant made a call to the label,

"We were thinking of taking the glue arrows off because we know where the glue goes." 

Jeff at the label replied "I think you should leave it, I think that's part of Eric's idea for the artwork." (it was)

Super silly but I thought it would be fun to draw some more attention to those little blobs of glue. I had noticed them on other CDs I bought and always enjoyed the fact that each blob was a little bit unique. Furthermore, it was like a "behind the scenes" moment for anyone who never thought about CD cover manufacturing. 

That album also came packaged with a bonus 36 page comic book and enhanced CD with a video game on it.

Sure, but what's that got to do with the new album?

Well, not much really. Except that this took place 20 years ago. And now we're in 2020. And the new album has 20 songs on it. And we are now in the phase of designing the artwork for it. So I thought I'd share some "behind the scenes" work in progress pics as we are finishing the artwork for the forthcoming album Creatures of the Late Afternoon. 

We won't be making CDs this time, but we will be making vinyl. 4 x 7" singles and a double 12" full length album.

This release is made possible by... wait for it... YOU!  So thank you patrons for your support!

This is the sketchbook in which I've been making many of the concept sketches, track notes, and designs for this project over the last couple of years...

Even though I used the same style of sketchbooks while working on Carpal, the artwork on this album will be a bit different. It will be printed in FULL COLOR!  Woah! Also, while Carpal was recorded in glorious MONO, Creatures will be cut in STEREO!!!

Let's start with the 7" singles. We will be releasing them in the coming months one at a time. The four covers will connect to make one bigger image kind of like those Wacky Pack stickers from when some of us were kids. 

Here's an early (very rough) concept sketch of the 7" records when they are assembled. 

But instead of it being hand drawn, we're going to photograph the cover using 3D sets that Corinne and Louisa made.  Some of these were early concept tests for exteriors in The Storyville Mosquito but built at an earlier scale too small for the new live puppets, so they've been sitting on a shelf in our workshop unfinished until now. They've found their true/new purpose! Currently they're plastered but not yet painted...

Here are a couple of the other buildings (still unpainted)...

Here's a color palette to give you an idea of what it will (sort of) look like when it's done. The blue lines show you how each of the 4 covers will connect together...

But why apartment buildings??

Well, that's part of the concept for this album. Creatures of the Late Afternoon is a collection of turntable tracks spanning several different styles, tempos and genres. Each track is written from the point of view of a different creature who lives in this imaginary apartment complex.

For those of you who lived in Montreal in the 90s, there used to be a whole apartment complex on La Gauchetière just west of St. Laurent.  It was maybe 4 stories high, and about 2 blocks long. At one point, I would say more than half of the active bands in Montreal either lived or practiced there. I remember going there to rehearse with Bullfrog all the time. At any moment if you stopped to listen, you could hear a punk band rehearsing in the basement, a DJ making beats upstairs, a jazz trio jamming downstairs, a composer scoring a film next door, a string quartet across the hall... The whole building was alive with music all day and night. The place was just buzzing with this incredible energy. It would be relatively quiet in the morning but by the late afternoon, the rehearsals would begin again and continue well into the after hours. 

Eventually, all the musicians and artists got kicked out and it was converted into a luxury hotel or high end offices but I remember those fun times before that when it literally felt like you were in an indoor music festival every day. The vibe, that place, that era was the main inspiration for this project. It was a small little world, but that building contained a big musical universe... Some of those bands, trios, quartets, I had heard but never met. We were divided by walls but oddly connected through music somehow. Imagine the movie Rear Window, only minus the murder mystery part, and instead in every window lived a creature with a turntable singing their songs through scratches. That was kind of the starting point for this project.

Right now I'm organizing which tracks will appear on each 7" single. Trying to keep the timing around 5-6 minutes per side for performance purposes. 

Here's one of the test creature designs. A mantis crab who sings...

here's another creature in an adjacent apartment, a keyboard playing arachnid...

and a third, some sort of sea anemone who plays modular synths...

And here's one my daughter Ruby designed... 

kind of looks like a one-of-a-kind blob of glue with eyes! I love it!

So as you can see, things are as silly as ever in our studio. So not much changed there in 20 years. But this time, instead of the album being packaged with a comic book and video game, Creatures of the Late Afternoon will be packaged with (mpc drum roll please).... A BOARD GAME!  HOORAY!  What year is this???

Yes, the gatefold 2LP record will (also) be a turntable board game and the 7" singles will have extra bands of interactive tones, beats and scratch sounds cut into them designed specifically for the game. You will need turntables, but other than that, no prior DJ experience necessary. You will learn some basic beat matching, juggling, shuffling, and needle dropping while you play. What fun!

Still working out the most functional layout for the album cover / game board here...

And testing some different ideas for the game vinyl...

Anyhow, lots of designing, lettering and building left to do. I'll be keeping you updated here. But we're getting closer!  

I'm looking forward to getting this album on to your stereos and this board game onto your coffee tables.  

Thank you again, dear patrons, for your support. This really would not have been possible without you. 

Take care and stay safe!

E