The Music Archive The music archive is my virtual duping group for unfinished songs, demos, scraps and forgotten tunes alike. 2008 / 2007 / 2006 / 2005 / 2004 / 2003 / 2002 2008 Tracks – Recorded June 28, 2008 "Tracks” was mentioned in a July 2008 Journal update: A guitar number called “Tracks” was thrown together just a few days ago. I recorded a quick acoustic guitar demo with Doumbek, shakers, and Mbira accompaniment. It’s pretty crude but acts as a good recording map for the future of the song. Again, not really album worthy material but still worth mentioning.   2007 Coming soon.   2006 Scattered – Recorded July 20, 2006 The title track that never made it to the actual album; “Scattered” was demoed on July 20, 2006 and then set aside. The concept of the song lived on however. The idea of a scattered life had been running around in my mind for a while. I had moved to Charlotte and all my friends and past band-mates were now scattered all across the globe and the music I was composing felt very disconnected as a result. Everything was scattered. I’m thinking I abandoned the song because it sounded too much like “Soul One” by Blind Melon. Shine Like You – Recorded September 22, 2006 "Shine Like You” was the working title for “The Story of Us” off of the Scattered album. I remember that this song came together extremely fast. The lyrics and music came very natural; even the recording of the song was simple and fast. It was the last track to be written for the album and is by far my favorite of the collection. “Shine Like You” is a great snapshot of the creative processes with its varying melody and rhythmic differences in the guitar track. A Cautionary Tale – Early 2006 Another out-take from the Scattered sessions, “A Cautionary Tale” was dropped mainly because of lyric issues. I had struggled with the message of the track for virtually the entire album’s recording process and I just got really fed up with it. But I always liked the music so here it is, in it’s unfinished mess. Close Your Eyes and Dream – Recorded January 2006 This demo was posted on my site as an end of year Christmas gift in 2006. An experimental track recorded during the Scattered “Closet” Sessions. The goal for this track was to make something different. I remember listening to a lot of “Sgt. Pepper” around this time; I had “Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds” on the mind while recording. The electric guitar is very random, recorded in atonal one take. The lyrics however we very carefully written with it’s experimental Burroughs’esk cut-up processes. Mixed down on 1/19/2006 and never touched again.   2005 Say Nothing At All – c. 2005 This song was recorded in the early tracking stages of Scattered; this mix was dated November 22, 2005. Vocals were never recorded because I was never happy with any of the melody lines I wrote. So the song exists in the form of piano and drums. The long drum section is the middle was intended as a bridge of sorts. I was going to record acoustic guitar overtop and go from there. As We Know It – 2005 An unfinished studio recording from the Hand Written Notes sessions in 2005, the track just needed to much work to include it on the EP so it was shelved. I still really enjoy it as it is virtually complete with the exception to a few tempo errors that could have been fixed.   2004 Levee – Circa 2004 This is a song that was written very close to the end of my run with Remains of the Day. I would guess that this demo was recorded around December of 2004 but I’m not sure. The song was tested out during a few of the last ROTD rehearsals but never garnered much interest from the guys. Rusty, however, did enjoy the song; so much so that he requested from the audience that I play it during my June 4, 2005 Acoustic Seen show in Greenville, SC. It showed up in a few sets during my August 2006 shows but that’s about it. Grey – Circa 2004 Another acoustic demo from late 2004; a little more obscure than others as this song was never developed any further. Acoustic guitar and adlibbed vocals, stumbling around some chords and testing out notes that I had a hard time hitting. I truly had forgotten about this song until I rediscovered it on a CD-R labeled “ROTD/ANDY Mixed Demos” on October 23, 2008. Enjoy. The Machine – Circa 2004 I always really enjoyed this song. Every now and then I’d stumble across it and think, “That’s got a lot of potential, I need to finish that one off.” I never got around to revising it. Not really sure on the date. I’m guessing that it’s 2004 because it sounds like it was recorded on my Powerbook.   2003 Coming Soon   2002 Instrumental 1 – c. 2002 One of three drum, bass and guitar instrumentals that were burned to a CD labeled “Pre-Taking From – Rare Demos.” I actually remember recording these tracks which is kind of odd when you think about how nothing was ever done with them. At the time Remains of the Day was searching for a new drummer to replace Cliff Sutton so Alex, Matthew and myself were all concentrating on writing new music for what would be our next album, Taking Form. This song (along with the other two) was recorded by myself probably around December of 2002. It was used once as menu music to an ROTD live Handlebar DVD. Instrumental 2 – c. 2002 Song two of the unnamed instrumental tracks. At the time I was really into using a program called Fruity Loops to create drum loops and other sounds. The synth and drums on this track a very Fruity Loops. Some of this experimentation had rubbed off on earlier ROTD recordings like “Simple Not To Feel” and “Horizon East.” Instrumental 3 – c. 2002 I vividly remember recording this track, mainly because I loved how the distorted bass sounded. I actually have this picture in my mind of playing the bass track. I was just having fun at the time.