The first track we recorded was "I Find It Cathartic". As with all tracks on the album, it was constructed as a straight journey from start to finish, learning about and experimenting with the various techniques digital technology made possible. Instead of the sequencers and pulse code modulators of the MMATT daze, sampled loops became the rhythmic building blocks. The file labelled "Dr. Magic's Audio Lab" is filled with marvels; sounds from the natural world, synth and drum samples, special effects, TV clips, you name it.
"Let serendipity be your guide, Grasshopper," Skit would say, "feel the track develop and let it speak to you, let it tell you what it is. Now stand like a crane on your office chair."

It spoke to me, and it said I am sinister, so I went with that, but the chair would never have taken my weight standing, so I politely declined. The title, given to it after listening to the finished product, the drill sounds and the uncomfortable laughter, was taken from a line of dialogue in the TV series, "Dark Matter", when Ryo is considering torturing someone.

Say cheese, it's time for your close up, Mr. Zoyd...

♪♫ Here he comes to save the day! ♫♪

The same day, we did "Mutant Flash Mob", which ultimately has become the most popular track on the album. It wasn't intended as dance music in any way, hence the lack of a consistent kick-drum, the title again being assigned retrospectively after hearing it whole for the first time. We got the sense of it being any other day (I said airport waiting lounge, Skit said shopping mall, I won!), fairly samo-samo  life, then suddenly a flash mob (we liked them being mutants) breaking into a dance, then all back to normal.

Another two days pass, October 5th, Skit returns for another session. In the morning, we did "Weather Or Not" for the IFAR label, then yearning for more digital adventures, set to work on "Crowd Close Door". The dance element on this was intentional, I think we had both quite liked how "Mutant Flash Mob" had come out and wanted to take it a step further, make it heavier and much more manic. The 'drum' is actually made from a sample of a door slamming. Felicity Kendal, Radio Rental, Chicken Oriental... MENTAL!

The weekend passes, our third session on the album and fourth together overall came on Tuesday 8th. The plan for the day was an electronic drone, built from looped synth samples, enhanced with a brief section of trip hop percussion. This is a personal favourite of mine, though Skit leans towards the noisier aspects of the album. The title, "Sky Dark Shadow", is nothing to do with it musically, actually coming from the fact the audio file looks just like a giant winged monster.

Session 5, Friday 11th, was quite our most prolific. We started in the morning with... well, coffee... then got onto the first project, strange rhythmic loop with blasting noises. I really wish we'd kept a note of the samples we were using, what we made them from et al, but this really was more a technical lesson. Again, looking at the audio file in WavePad, we saw a small headed beast, which was what we originally called it, before deciding we preferred "Small Headed Gods" once it came to assembling the finished release.

Skit records the power chord sample (it's a G)...

Skit gets a sample from the Moog Liberation

"Single Diminutive Impression" came next, with a very recognisable opening sample taken from the E-Bow intro I did on The Thamesmead Rollers "Armegeddon Time" back in the early 90's! I don't know why, but we both had the 1969 moon landing in our heads at the time we were realising this one, hence the title being a few thesaurus look-ups away from "One Small Step".

Third track of the day was "Sweet Voices Poison", using samples of female vocal, pure notes, then effecting and combining them in different ways, including the use of harmonic discordance to add a disturbing plaintive element. It didn't quite fit when it came to putting the finished album together, but was later remixed as "Lacrimae Angelis Dei (Requiem)" for Chris Phinney's Harsh Reality.
The fourth and final track of the session was "The Unrepentant Ten", so called because it was the tenth track we had recorded, but that later changed to "In Bitter Repentance"...

The final session came the day after, Saturday 12th. We wanted to do two more tracks, so we had ten for the final album, so you know another  one isn't going to make the final cut already. That was "Scream Free Triptych", that's the one that has the power chord sample, in case you were wondering. Again, it simply wasn't a good fit, though was later remixed and conceptually perfect as "Time Triptych" for {AN} Eel's Charlie Dog label.

The final piece of the puzzle was originally titled "Erroneous Vector Collection", Skit's chaotic favourite track on the album, the nature of which got it rebranded as "Chaotic Vector Collection" for the finished release.

"The butterfly has settled on the lotus flower, my friend," Skit smiled as we completed that last track, "in 9 days you have embraced the digital and created a new album."

"But I could not have done it without you, Skit!" I bowed my head in humble gratitude.

"Stop being a cunt," he says, "and make me some fucking dinner..."

One full album under our belt, it's dinner time!

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