For the uninitiated out there, first of all, welcome to my blog, thanks for checking it out!
And secondly, I am not just a graphic designer, I also like to dabble in music.
And by dabble, I mean, it’s like my main hobby…
I write a lot of music & lyrics for my band, The Wild Strays, as well as playing guitars (mostly Lead). We’ve been active for a few years now and it has of course had it’s ups-&-down, but we soldier on and attempt to release new music when time & budget allows.
Luckily for you, an attempt was recently made and so far could be considered successful. We have recently released a new song…
And here it bloody well is!
Excuse the passive aggressive phrasing there, I’m just going for as many puns as I can bleed out (I can literally hear the tumbleweeds rolling across…).
So, anyway, we have a NEW song and it’s called… (Drum roll please)
BLOOD!
That’s right, now the title makes sense. The new also represents the process, because this isn’t just a straight up Wild Strays song, it’s actually a collaboration! The Wild Strays (Myself and Liam McCarthy) teamed up with up-and-coming pop singer, Jack Jordan, in an attempt to make a more Wild, more heavy version of one of this singles.
And here it is! Followed by a little backstory of the project…
The project was a bit of a surprise to us and also a bit of a challenge.
Our friend, Kyle Sheldon, was tasked with working on another version of Jack’s Single: Blood, as part of a project that saw multiple versions of the song being created by different artists. You can check out Kyle’s awesome version on Spotify.
Soon after, Kyle nominated us to do a heavier version of the song and Jack was all for it, so me and Liam got to work on our first official collaboration!
We started with all the vocal tracks from Jack, all ready mixed, along with a backing track to use as a guide. We tried to build upon the track as if we were just jamming along to the song but we wasn’t quite feeling it. This was new territory for us, so admittedly, we wasn’t sure what we were doing (#Professionals). We decided on a different approach…
Remove the backing track. Play as you go.
It worked. Surprisingly. We actually recorded the guitars backwards, starting from a reprise of the chorus we opted for. By backwards, I mean we started with the last chorus and then proceeded to do the preceding section; with the Intro being the last part we wrote.
I wrote and recorded the bass, rhythm & lead guitars. Liam wrote all the drums. We merged it together, re-iterated a few times, drank a lot of tea and many sleepless days later, we had a finished song! After some amateur-to-semi-professional mixing from myself, Kyle checked it out with his more adept ears and we finished by mastering it using LANDR.
And well… You can hear the result! We hope you enjoy it 😊
This is a Wild Strays first in so many ways: First new song in years (literally!), first official collaboration, first home-produced release and most importantly…
The First New Wild Strays Record with The Incredible Liam ‘ElementalDrop’ McCarthy on Drums!
So yes, we finally got Liam on record! And damn it, does he not sound incredible? He’s been a Wild Stray for 2 years now, so we are pleased that his style and ability can finally shine through our music. And I suppose this is a good time to mention that we ARE currently working on our new album. It’s called…
Hope Isn’t Dead; It’s Just Missing In Action
Check out our preview (with some more Liam on it) here…
Talking about this record warrants an entire post, so I’m hoping to do a more dedicated update soon.
Until then, thanks for reading…
Stay safe, stay Greater Than Hate!
Grace
x
GreaterThanHate 