January 2004
Esucarys has just completed a very trying year. For those of you close to the band, you’ve seen a side of the music biz that is rarely seen…reality, or at least our version of reality. All this aside, Esucarys (Steve Koelling on Keyboards/vocals, Eric Hernandez on drums and other things that go “boom”, and myself Steve Sorrell on vocals/guitars/bass) are back on track and ready to kick the new record in the…tail.
Steve Koelling and I have resumed the writing process for “Shadows of the Past”, the follow-up to our debut release “Diary of a Lost Soul”. With the demo tracks for the opening song “With These Hands” (a 16 minute monstrosity) recorded, we decided to move forward to, where else but, track 2. As a concept album we are writing and recording the songs in the order that they will appear on the CD. This way we can allow the story to grow as the music happens, and let the previous song feed the next.
Steve K. and I have our own approaches to the song writing process, and therefore bring different things to the table. Steve K. is the one who writes most of the big chord progressions, which usually become verses, dramatic keyboard interludes and choruses. I (as the guitarist) bring hook-lines and guitar riffs, which become intros, signature rhythms, solos and progressive sections. We then record all these pieces and start assembling, that’s where the magic begins. This is when we add our own ideas to each other’s parts. Then, the arrangements come together, and songs are born.
Steve K. and his brother Rick write the majority of the lyrics. I contribute some lyrical ideas, and maybe even a few useable pieces, but generally I just add melody lines to them. The story line itself is constantly evolving. We’ve been bouncing ideas back and forth for a couple of years, but the story itself belongs to Steve K. I’d tell you more about it, but I’d have to track you down and erase your memory (yeah, I watch too much TV).
We’ll be adding more updates as we work our way toward the 80-minute mark.
Steve
Sorrell.
