2004 in review
Personally, 2004 was a great year for me in many ways. It saw the birth of my daughter, Hannah Elaine, another year of marriage to my wife Sarah, and my son Collin starting kindergarten. I also became more and more involved and active in my church, especially running live sound for both regular services and special events.
Musically, 2004 was a year of intense studio work punctuated by several performances. I was blessed to perform at the Shelter (Detroit) in January with my good friend Josh Schnable, debuting material that will be on our collaborative record to be released in 2005. I also traveled to Montreal with the thinkbox crew for a performance at the Mutek festival in June, which was a great trip and overall experience.
As far as thinkbox-related news for 2004, we released our second record, entitled “guitar”, in the thematic series thinkox editions. I had two tracks on that record, which made up the sum total of my recorded output that was released in 2004. I also made the hard decision to step back from my previous level of involvement with thinkbox and take the role of a contributing artist rather than a core group member. I will still be involved in thinkbox projects and events, however, and I treasure the work we’ve done together (and will continue to do).
Finally, looking foward to the future: I made reference to the fact that 2004 was a year of intense studio work, and a number of the projects that were worked on will finally see the light of day in 2005. My long-time friend Josh Schnable and I have been working on an album’s worth of material for around 3 years now, and that album is finally finished and being sent to various labels for release consideration. We’re both extremely excited about it, and can’t wait for it to be available to hear and experience.
I’ve also been working on a project of collaborations for the past year (initial production began in December of 2003) entitled “songs in the night”. This project has been very special to me, as it’s the first of my artistic endeavours to directly reference my Christian faith, and I’ve been blessed to be able to bring in a number of very talented guest artists to contribute, including Listener (Mush, Deepspace5), Double Helix (Transmat, Emoticon, Rush Hour), and others. The first 2/3 of 2004 were spent in production for the record, and I’ve been slowly working with the guest artists to put together the shared music we’ve been working on. I expect this record to be released in 2005 sometime, though no plans are certain as to label or release date at this point.