futuro: a blog

012: And another...

2008-06-17T07:43:00.000-07:00

Another gig coming up this week, this time upstairs as the Classic Grand in Glasgow. Thursday 19th June, supporting the mighty Goose. Come!

See!
Omar playing his drums!
Hear!
Jon loop his vocals and sing backing vocals with himself!
Experience!
Nick playing bass like the lord intended!

See you there

011: The morning after...

2008-04-30T09:47:00.000-07:00

Well, that was fun! We didn't get onstage till around 11.30 which was a bit late for a lot of folks, and unfortunately half our crowd had already left to get the last train home, so it was quieter than we hoped, but we still had fun nonetheless (and raised a good few hundred pounds for charity).

We played (in order)

The Difference
Slow Motion
Lights Out
Edit You Out
Ransom
Impossible
Aramis

followed by an impromptu encore of Easy Money

Ransom wen't suprisingly well since we only played it for the first time the week before so it went well! Impossible also sounded pretty good and the crowd seem to enjoy both so thats awesome. I think we're going to start posting preview tracks soon, live tracks, remixes and all sorts. And since we are pretty much done recording, hopefully have single+album details very soon, as well as a lengthy summer tour (we hope).

Incidentally, if you were at the gig last night and took pictures (saw some flashes flashing), post em or send em to us.

love ya

j

010: More Artwork...

2008-04-26T19:17:00.000-07:00

Heres some more photos from the Lines In Motion artwork design.

Our friends. Tied in cables.

Andy Jackson

Hinda Khogali

Stuart Kirkwood

and more to come. These aren't necessarily looking how they will in the final product, as these are the full frame images, and they'll no doubt be cropped and tweaked a bit between now and then, but it gives you an idea of the style.

Since this graphics/photo business is one of my areas of expertise, and for those interested in such things - here is the original of Andys photo, so you can see the differences and the sheer power of image editing!

Pretty cool huh? Yeah, more to come from Lee Hall, Ben Hall, Nick Roan, Grieg Wright, Amy Somerville, Me and Omar. Awesome.

See you tuesday?

j x

009: Some More Information

2008-04-14T06:58:00.001-07:00

see you there?

008: Ransom, Impossible and Nice N Sleazy

2008-04-12T18:47:00.000-07:00

Few new tracks underway (its ever evolving), Ransom and Impossible. Impossible isn't really... new, per se, but some decent(ish) lyrics are... almost ready to put down vocals on them and finish that track off for good. Ransom however is completely new, and a little different from everything else so far, which of course opens the can of worms of new directions and more tracks.

Question: If one track stands out on album in terms of style being different from the rest, should it really go on the album? Will it just appear out of place, or provide a fresh change for a moment?

Sub Question: Should a re-recorded 'Next Time' go on the album? Hmmm...

In gig news however, we're back on April 29th (for real this time) at Nice N Sleazy, and it'll be our first gig this year. Nervous? Why yes. Hopefully we can have Ransom ready for then, maybe a sampler cd for y'all, and people can get acquainted with Nick, our new(ish) bassist!

So thats tuesday 29th. Its for Oxjam, so all in a good cause.

007: Completely Unrelated

2008-03-23T19:18:00.000-07:00

Completely unrelated to anything Futuro, but a good looking mixture for fake blood is:

1. a cup of warm water
2. some golden syrup
3. some red food colouring
4. a splash of green food colouring
5. a spoonful or two of cocoa powder.

Not only does it look pretty good (if you get a good consistency) but it tastes pretty good too.

I spent Saturday covered in the stuff for a short film we worked on. Its all part of retrocausal's plan to take over the world one media type at a time. My first 'acting job' too and I must say it was quite fun. Other things Retrocausal (and by that I mean 'Futuro and friends') are working on are:

Futuro's album (obviously)
Several short movies (including the above)
Music for various adverts that we've been asked to provide
New T-shirt designs, both Futuro and non.

Told you we were busy. Although technically yes, this does eat into album making time, but again, its all part of the plan :)

j x

006: Cancellation! Alert!

2008-03-20T16:45:00.000-07:00

What are the chances? But yeah, Edinburgh gig this Saturday is cancelled. Its no ones fault, and its all going to be rescheduled, so we'll be back soon enough. We do have a gig coming in Glasgow, near the end of April (Tuesday 29th, for Oxjam) but hopefully something else sooner too.

We're working on a few other projects this weekend, that are not fully Futuro related, and we'll probably post a lil bit about that too, because, why not.

x

005: Rehearsals and Technicals

2008-03-19T18:16:00.001-07:00

Been rehearsing again, and it has been a while since we were in this zone of loud playing and having fun. Its only after a few months (really) of not playing/gigging that you realise how it keeps you fit! But good to get back on the horse. We've forgotten lyrics, tempos and all sorts, but after 30 mins we were back on track like we never left.

The pic above represents my semi-circle of pedals, and while its not THAT impressive compared to some others, its a little playground for me. If anyone is interested, heres whats going on up there.

Guitar goes into that zoom multi fx at the left. Its not very good and pretty old, but it comes equipped with a startlingly good -2/+2 octave shifter. That noise of the guitar winding down at the start/mid of lights out - thats the puppy there. It also has a decent delay on it, which i can control the time/volume of with the expression pedal, for some funky on/off delay antics.

From there we go to a boss multi fx (me-50). Its not bad, and has the harmoniser, delay, reverb and compressor that I use a fair bit. It also has a pretty little ring mod attached to the expression pedal, which the new re-mixed version of Easy Money (on the album) has in the second verse. Its like a synth on a guitar.

And then from there, my best friend, the looper. I rambled on about this in the past, but it allows me to record something live and play it back, while playing over it. Not just guitar too, but vocals also - hence why I now have 2 mic's live (it's not just wankyness). Perfect example would be in the chorus to lost in the mess, where I play the high guitar part and sing away into 'loop mic' as normal. Then come chorus no.2, i play that back, and play the chord backing and harmonise with myself. Its quite interesting! One guy said i was cheating and miming, but i'm not, everything you hear (bar 2 samples because I dont have an organ or a symphonic orchestra on stage) is recorded live and looped at some point, so its performance in a way, not cheating!

And yeah, thats my pedals. I'm gonna get another that I plug my loop vocal into so I can distort/delay/pitch my vocals for some more weird effects, which could be fun.

Gone are the days where I set up with 1 cable going from guitar to amp. Now its a mess, but a nice sounding one!

Gig @ Edinburgh on Saturday - Wee Red Bar / Edinburgh College of Art - come along.

x

004: Photoshoots and Artwork

2008-03-13T17:00:00.000-07:00

To prove we have been busy, have a featurette. The first of many to come, this one detailing the rather fun time we had photographing our friends to feature in the album artwork/booklet. It looks a bit odd, and frankly it is.

People in white, tied up in cables. It does actually mean something other than looking cool. It represents our struggles over the last year, with shirts and cables representing business and creativity. Arty? Probably, but in the end, it looks cool. The background to our site proper was the test shot (and most likely the front cover) and these will feature throughout the booklet art, adverts and all sorts.

Thanks to us (Jon, Nick and Omar), and to our fine friends: Lee, Ben, Amy, Stuart, Andy, Hinda, Greig and Paul. Thank you.

p.s. the album will be available online worldwide, and to order from the site worldwide also. We might even get the likes of amazon into it. Stay tuned. x

003: Another Format War, But A Good One

2008-03-06T16:22:00.001-08:00

We've been talking about different ideas for this release, different ways to approach it all in light of the 2007 FuturoGate scandal (see post 001), and its actually... fun.

Y'see, when you work with 'others' you get tied into schedules, formats and in the end, you are just all tangled up with no-one really knowing what to do next. Thats kind of how I see the music industry now. It's a whole load of people, all a little bit confused and 'winging it'. It's not really an insult because, well, we feel that way too.

When you discuss a project with distributors/promotions/retail, the issue of formats arises. It's fairly safe to say that the CD Single (or 'physical single') is no longer a valid product in todays market. Even I admit that i'm more likely to buy a single from iTunes rather than go into the shop and buy a single on cd for £1.99 or more. But aside from that, the shape of the album packaging, 7" Vinyl vs 12", CD Singles or EP's - they all heavily affect how your release will fair in the world of retail. Awkward packaging means it wont sit in the racks properly. Vinyl is pretty much ignored in prime retail, and EP's aren't chart eligble (should you want go down that road).

The problem here is that even if you don't want to go down that road, you can be sure your distributor does. Because if it charts well, it sells more, and if it sells more, they earn more. Makes sense! But in a creative way, it's also limiting.

But here's the thing - we love physical releases. Sure i'll buy the odd single off iTunes, but i'll buy an album on cd and/or vinyl. I like the booklet, I like reading the liner notes while i listen for the first time. I must admit, I'm also a sucker for the limited edition packaging.

So y'know what? Thats what we're going to go for. Multiple formats, varying features, various options to you, the 'consumer', the 'end-user'. Like vinyl? Have it on vinyl. Like FLAC encoded high quality audio? Have that too. Limited Edition numbered and signed 12" Gatefold with litho prints inside? Why the hell not.

We'll have more info on all this when we have thrashed out the details ourselves, but I thought I would stop by and let you know that we're kinda at that stage now, so the release isn't too far off...

I would also like to announce while we're here, and while I'm talking about limited releases etc that the legendary Andy Jackson (who remixed some early Futuro tracks under 'JFunc') is working with me (more me working with him actually) on a full length remix album featuring every track from Lines in Motion reworked, to be released at the same time as the album itself. Interested? You should be!

More recording soon to tie up loose ends. Promise to take pictures this time.

j

002: Looking Back, Looking Forward

2008-02-02T13:19:00.000-08:00

Looking Back:

Watching the Futuro: The Complete First Season live dvd for the first time since we released it. That was a year and a half ago and its quite weird to watch. Good, but weird! Although Futuro: The Complete Second Series has been delayed somewhat, we'll put it down to the writers strike...

Looking Forward:

Tomorrow we record some live Cello for 'Edit You Out' to bulk out that finishing score that bit more, pretty epic. I'll video it.

j x

001: What went wrong, and where it goes from here

2008-01-03T23:49:00.000-08:00

Hi

We'll start of 2008 with a bit of closet-cleaning at camp Futuro.

2007 was a bit of a washout eh? Not much happened, and I think instead of posting the usual 'its coming soon' teaser posts, I'd give you something a bit more substantial and explain why 2007 played out the way it did.

If i was to sum it up in one short sentence, I think it would be: "We deviated from the plan, and got lost".

For anyone that was watching us go from the beginning of 06, we had this 'DIY ethic' where we done everything ourselves. Recording, Production, Design, Web, Video, Tour Booking, everything. It also worked a bit. Without a complete breakdown of what went on in the first year - we came up with a system and it worked (to an extent). Things were getting 'big' for us, and I think what REALLY happened, was that we panicked a bit. The possibility of being a working artist was becoming a reality and we wanted to make sure we got it right. By doing that, we ended up stalling the whole thing quite badly.

After the Season 1 DVD was released, we got Lights Out ready. It was meant to come out in February on our own new label Retrocausal. What was *supposed* to happen was that another single would be out in April, and a full length album in May. Then we'd tour tour tour tour tour tour and tour some more. We pictured the Season 2 DVD being a few music videos and a massive documentary following us around the uk (and beyond).

The reality? We released Lights Out, put a nice (if i do say so myself) video out for it, and then sat back and done nothing. For a year.

Well thats how it looks anyway. The ACTUAL reality is a bit more complex!

We released Lights Out late, at the end of march/april. It was late because iTunes need 6/8 weeks to get the music onto their stores. Its the same for U2, Radiohead and anyone else. It takes time. So to have a release date where press could talk about, radio could announce it, and we could actually promote it, we had to delay the release. Sorting all this out was a bit problematic though, and we ended up doing nothing but sort all this out. Graemes work schedule was killing us, as were the financial drains.

The release wasn't a flop by any means, and we had more downloads of the track and video than any other futuro release, but we just didn't and couldn't gig enough to get the word out, and that began the loss of momentum.

Anyways, we decided to do things a little differently and put more into the album campaign to 'do it right'. We still wanted to (and still do) self release through Retrocausal, and decided to journey to the big smoke to get a team of pro's working us on press/radio. This is when we discovered why the music industry is so inherently fucked.

In June we went to London Calling, a music industry trade show where you meet with business services, labels, distributors and such like. We also travelled around London meeting similar types to discuss our release plan. The reaction to the music was good, and we got a few big (and expensive) companies interested. What we discovered though, is that it really takes months for any of these people to make a decision, and that they have no problems leading you on and then pulling out at the last minute. We wanted the album out, in August, then October, then January and now it looks like its going to be April or later.

Releasing an album into the big wide world is complicated (if you use traditional distribution and promotional routes) and the amount of time it takes to co-ordinate this is flat out insane. Not only that, but the best laid plans seem to fall apart as people almost whimsically decide not to bother in the end. One company would say 'yeah, i think an October release would work for us' and another would say 'nah, October is too busy for us, how about January' and the other would say 'January is no good for us, how about...' and it all falls apart quickly.

The side effect from all this is that you lose momentum personally too. Its hard enough to hold down a job (Omar and I are both college lecturers in our 'fields' of audio and video/design) as well as co-ordinate an album release, let alone feel creative enough to approach the task as an artist too. As a result, the album still isn't 100% finished as of now.

The main problem creatively, is that its been so long since the last release, that to put out an album with 50% old tracks and 50% new doesn't feel enough now. Its been too long a wait to only put out 6 new tracks, most of which have been heard live in some way now.

So did we miss the boat? Maybe. Its certainly going to be a lot harder now. We built up a massive amount of buzz all on our ownsome, and then it all went tits up when we started to involve other people. A slap on the wrist for us. We're not trying to pass ALL the blame though. Personally I know I've been less creatively active in the last few months than I should be, but then when plans fall apart for 4th or 5th time, you start to get disheartened.

I've rambled enough about the history, so what about the future?

Well, in short, we're not giving up just yet! We have what we feel is a great album almost done. Artwork is nearly complete and a few videos on their way for singles. But aside from that, in a business sense, we're having to look at things a little differently. Radiohead have brought DIY -Music to the attention of mass media now (they aren't the first, but they are the biggest to do it - but is anyone else really disapointed that they used a label for the physical release???), and Saul Williams/NIN tested new ground with a donation based digital download only release (which is quite openly documented, and very interesting).

What I plan to do personally, is document absolutely everything we do in both a creative and business sense. That way, if this simply doesn't work, at least there will be an interesting read about how it all fell apart. With any luck it wont be as cut and dried as that, and we'll get some degree of personal and creative satisfaction out of the whole thing. With a LOT of luck, we'll do something fairly groundbreaking and have an incredible story to tell.

The album cover is the new background image at wearefuturo.com - it represents this struggle quite well we feel.

Lets see what happens eh?

j x