Recent times have seen me blogging rather sporadically and claiming almost consistently that I'll be back to blogging. My time away from the world of blogging wasn't because I wanted to quit or something. It's just that over the past few months, life has had so much to offer and there are so many new things to focus on. So my time away can be considered as a sort of unofficial hiatus for me to refresh my perspectives and learn new things before returning with spanking new weaponry with unlimited ammunition. It was great to take a break, but the more time I spent away from blogging, the more I missed it! Plus, it made me feel a bit old and rusty not exercising my writing, so I'm going to have to rev things up again! First up, what happened since the last update...
A poetry slam was held at my campus on the 19th of March 2009. All three classes had to send representatives, and apparently my class was informed rather late, on the week it was held! We needed to write a poem to be performed during the event. This is a new challenge as I don't usually write poetry! Thanks a lot to Anisah, for co-writing the poem with me, Kim, for contributing the idea for the opening stanza, and my group mates, for contributing ideas! After performing the poem in front of class, my lecturer sent me and a few other students to represent my class for the slam! It was certainly a new experience for me, because not only am I performing alone, but I'm performing it without my most relied on asset: a musical instrument! I had to rely entirely on pure gut and delivery. I learned A LOT from the night, I have to say, and I think this experience will help me the next time I get to gig!
Talking about poetry brings us to something which I haven't blogged about in AGES: academics. Being in a new course feels... different! First of all, the workload is WAY LESS than what I'm used to. That doesn't mean that it's any easier, though! It was slightly intimidating and I was nervous as well because I have pretty much no basic unlike my classmates, who have learned their stuff back in matriculation. But after time, I'm kind of happy that I can not only cope, but also breeze through things. Plus, some of the introduction courses that are made compulsory for us to take are REALLY interesting. I had the chance to learn Psychology, supposedly the hardest of all the HS intro subjects. Despite what people say, it's a really fun subject and it's not exactly rocket science. You can actually relate to it quite easily! It worried me a bit initially that I was having much more fun doing a non-major subject (thanks to a great lecturer and great classmates!) than my major subjects, and it did get to me at times. There were times I asked myself "Now why am I doing this..." or "What am I doing here...", and it did get to me at a few points. It's tough when you have many interesting subjects and courses under one faculty! But what's important through out the semester is that I feel relieved! Though at times, I do miss my previous course and course-mates, but life has to go on!
Now, on to other things!
I mentioned previously that I might come up with a new blog layout. Yes, I will do so, and I am working on it, but I'm taking my time doing this, because a blog layout is just a layout in the end, what matters the most is the content. When I change the layout doesn't exactly matter. It could be tomorrow, next week, or heck, even next year! I'll just change it when I feel like changing it! What I really want to work on is the content, and it's going to be quite some work as I haven't blogged in quite a while!
Next, my songs which I have mentioned quite a number of times over the past few months. It definitely has taken a LONG TIME! The first time I ever mentioned publicly about writing songs is in 2005! That's 4 years worth of time to write songs. It took time partly because it bugged that one moment I would write something that's so deep and *cough* romantic *cough*, and the other second, something that... doesn't kind of suit me (supposedly because of how I look!) would come out! Not to say that it's heavy, heck, I've heard some of the heaviest stuff ever, so heavy it makes Slipknot sound like Backstreet Boys to my ears! But yeah, I was wondering how to piece everything together as everything is just so incoherent. Then, it just struck me a few days ago, that since this is my solo project, anything goes! It's not like I'm writing them for a band. When I write for a band, it's for the band. When I'm playing sessions, I adapt to the star of the show to bring out the best in him or her. So when I'm alone, I'm doing it for me, because ultimately, I'm making music for myself, not for a company! I just want to make music because I love it and because I want to share it. It doesn't matter if one song is heavy and another is sappy! (though it took me SO LONG to realize it!)
As for details on the recording, I'm still unsure whether it's going to be an EP/LP/album/whatever you call it. That depends entirely on the number of songs that I will soon decide. It's going to be titled "A Moment Apart", and I'm playing all the instruments (guitars, bass, keyboards) sans drums (I'm programming drums on a couple of tracks and using samples on the rest). It's completely self-produced, self-mixed, self-financed, and it's recorded entirely in the comfort of my bedroom, which explains the delay of both recording and working on the songs: my bed is just too tempting! Right now, I'm still unsure if I'm going to put my voice into this project, because I don't want to cause a horrible thunderstorm every time you press the play button on your MP3 player! How it'll turn out, will be revealed quite soon :)
Plus, because I'm going to release a collection of songs, I need a label to release it on. Because I'm doing it the DIY route, I'm also going to release it under my own self-operated label which I'm working on, called ilusinyata. Currently, it's just a label/name/banner for me to release my own material, but depending on how things go, and if I could, I do want to produce and release works by other acts as well! Perhaps I should start with my friends... Plus, ilusinyata isn't focused on just releasing music, I'm also going to release other forms of media, such as videos, poetry and much more. I'm doing it alone for now, but I might tag some people in along the way!
Ok, that's quite a bit of updates for now, I need to go back to finishing up a few new tracks, so until the next time!
- nazriq
