This track was intended to be ‘rap’ beat based around that opening guitar loop but, as usual, I got carried away and it soon swelled into a full eight minute composition in three movements (with three tempo changes)! My warped idea for the three sections was:
i. [0:00] On earth/technical preparation
ii. [2:24] The journey to the moon
iii. [4:58] Bumping along the moon’s surface in a NASA Impala!
This is my sixth song about the moon – wish I knew why la Luna is such a reoccurring theme in my tracks? Seeing my psychiatrist on Wednesday.
This song features a lot of turntable melody scratching. This is a technique where a long tone is bent using the turntables pitch control or through manually ‘tweaking’ the speed of the record. It can be heard in the track at 1:23 and 6:01. On both occasions I’m attempting to play a ‘solo’ on the turntable – sounds like a wonky synthesizer or theremin!
When I first began playing the turntable in bands it soon became apparent that tradition scratching didn’t always meld that well with the other instruments. Anthony Donaldson encouraged me to not only use the turntable as a layer of texture or percussion but to play ‘with’ the band and even attempt carrying the lead melody of a piece! This was an amazing insight and pretty much changed my whole approach to the turntable from that point forward.
For a fantastic example of this melodic scratching style check out Kid Koala’s ‘Drunk Trumpet’:
Beautiful! High-five’s were abound the day I first saw that clip…
DOWNLOAD: There are seas on the moon, what about beaches?
Over & Out,
Alphabethead
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