I’m currently in the midst of one of those frustrating but exciting passages of time – one in which lots has been happening but it’s not yet all ready for presentation – and my knack for taking on more projects than is wise reaches critical mass as summer arrives, and my music students go on holiday. So here, in what WordPress tells me is my 50th blog post, is a quick rundown of what I’ve been doing and what’s coming next…
Venusian
I got involved with this ambient/trip-hop group quite a few months back and, after some writing, recording and gigging, we’re making a push to be more enterprising about the project. On my part that means treating it as a more direct output for some dark experimentation and improvisation, such is the band’s overall intention. When I first started playing bass with John and Yash (Venusian’s founders and sole members for several years) I think I was being too ordinary with it, treating the instrument with hesitation whilst limiting myself to being a side-member of the band as I worked the final stages of Glossom at the time. Now I’m breaking out the violin bow and effects to help make Venusian be the success it’s capable of, and we’re currently working on the next album. At the time of writing our next gig is on the 11th August at Next To Nowhere social centre in Liverpool. If that sounds like your cup of tea then have a read of the new Venusian page on my Portfolio and follow us on Facebook.
Neverbody
In my post-Glossom world I quickly found an instrumental band-shaped hole that needed filling and obsessing over. The result is Neverbody, a new trio I formed with ex-Glossom drummer Gareth Dawson and musician + good friend Andrew Bailey who takes up the bass. I don’t have a whole lot to say about it right now as we’re in the process of writing enough material to make a live set (4 tunes down so far), but it has been taking up a fair bit of time and, like Glossom, it is proving an effective outlet for stretching my capabilities (and fingers) as a writer and performer on the guitar. So far it is sounding less jazz and more prog. More on this when I have it…
The ambient project
Over the years I’ve put together a fair number of electronic and orchestral soundscapes that have never got any closure. Some were sketches from soundtracks I was working on at the time, other were just bits of fun that never got completed. I sort of mentioned this in a blog post rounding up 2016, but it still floated around in a ‘done-when-it’s-done’ holding pattern because I just didn’t want to slap a bunch of sounds together and call it an album. And it is still floating around like that really, but I have been working on making it a more consistent, cohesive collection of tracks and intend to set up a whole new alias to release the kind of material that doesn’t have any other home in my output. I want to go into more detail in a separate post, but the reason I’m doing it is because lots of small, curious moments in everyday life cause me to bank ideas and short recordings that sometimes are later expanded into full on explorations. I’m certain this is true of many artists in many mediums, but for me that has so far manifested itself in a minimalist/ambient kind of way, and it dawned on me as a terrible waste for these ephemeral dittys never to see the light of day, even if the end product exists only for personal satisfaction. To echo the above, more on this when I have it…
Film score, the website, and more
I also started working with a local director to put together a score for their short film. We had a lengthy and spiriting conversation in our first meeting about support (or a perceived lack thereof) for funding and building a community around grassroots narrative film in and around Liverpool. A surprising thing I would have thought, considering that it’s apparently the most-filmed city in the UK outside of London. We’re in the early stages at the moment but I’m hoping to share more about the film and its maker soon.
The website has undergone a bit of pruning and updating, mainly adding new projects to the portfolio and adding a bit more emphasis to my work as a guitar player. I’ve also updated a lot of images so that they load faster. Meanwhile, there are some rumblings about The Little Mermaid – the storytelling performance with the Liverpool Players – getting a show overseas, but again I can’t say much more until things are confirmed.
Right, I’m done being a tease. Bye for now!
Alex Cottrell 