A full day and evening of work on War And Nuclear Love. The tracks needed some essential final changes to the start and end parts of each track. This morning I extended the start to the title track to blend it with the prior 'Radioactive'. This won't be the case on the stream version though, only a future (and perhaps unlikely) CD version.
I then went into the garden and recorded the old rusty luggage trolley, which can fold out. Flexing this resulted in a suitably creepy metal swing sound, perfect for the zombie park on Post-Apocalyptic Playground. Then, finally recorded the vocals for the title track. I've changed some of the words. Verse 2 now reads:
Look at the switches
The flashing lights
There's something of a Christmas morning here
Handsome generals
Encourage me to play
And I've nothing better to do today
I pray and hide
God tells me he's on the side of
War and nuclear love etc.
Added the new vocals to the song this afternoon, and added some harmonies for the 3rd lines of these verses (though not the Christmas line, this sounds better without the harmony, it's more conversational than musical). The final step was the 'solo' for this song, which I'd forgotten about. I grabbed the guitar and spent an hour experimenting. Playing chords to the part seemed to sound better somehow, but nothing was quite right. I took a break at 3pm, then decided to record power chords for the final chorus (easy to play now the key is up, simply E-min, C-Maj, A-Maj, E-Maj/Emin). Then played a simple lead solo in an instant for the proper solo part. Thus, the song is complete.
I've noticed that many tracks have a slight tendency to be stronger on the left, perhaps due to my preference for that ear. I've adjusted Post-Apocalypse to match.
Overall, I'm happy with this EP, particularly the new tracks. My singing and production skills have never been better, nor has my keyboard and guitar playing, not that I've ever been much of a guitar player. So, this is a good time to at least create some music, and I am keen to get that old song of 'Written on Rice' out there; and the war theme seems to be culturally appropriate...
Some slight cover changes:
Tomorrow I'll charge into the sheet music, this may take two days.
