For this week's blog, I decided to do something a little different. Hope you enjoy.
If there’s anything from making this album taught me, it’s that I can’t keep promises.
If I had kept my promises, then this album wouldn’t exist at all, instead, it would’ve remained in my subconscious till the day I died. Now, I bet you’re wondering why, well here is the reason.
Last summer, while driving to work, something terrible happened. It wasn’t a physical car crash or accident, but rather a mental car wreck. In one sudden moment, my stability came crumbing down. I just couldn’t think straight at all, and I think my musical ambitions had become more than I could handle. So at that point in time, I set in motion my plan to quietly exit the so-called rap game, possibly leaving for good.
For about 6 months or so, I led a quiet and almost pointless life, trying to find something else to thoroughly obsess me, with nothing doing. I stopped writing songs and making beats, and just returned to who I was before I started rapping. Meanwhile, many of my friends that I stayed in contact with were asking if I was still rapping and all that. I told them that I was “taking a break” or “I don’t know yet”.
For that period of time, I was wondering if I was as good as everyone thought I was, and if I either made a fool of myself, or became somebody for once in my life.
Then, in January 2008, something happened. My dad came home one night after picking up a pizza, and he saw a friend of mine working there. Out of curiosity, the friend asked if I was still rapping, and my dad was unsure of my status, so replied with a simple “I don’t know, I think he’s taking a break”. The friend replied by saying, “Well, I thought that his music was really good.”
Suddenly, that cold part of me that pretty much wanted to retire back in that car on that summer day, began to disappear. After mulling it for a few days, I officially announced my return on January 19th, 2008, and slowly began to conceptualize the next project.
At first, it was intended to be an EP of sorts with a full-length coming some time after, but the EP never made it out the hangar. One of the titles that I was bouncing around for the new music was “The Darkest of Afflictions”, a line that I got from a Jedi Mind Tricks song and also accurately described my life from the start of the summer, to the current point in time.
Eventually, I started to write some of the lyrics, albeit in a staggered, stop-and-go fashion, along with the production. To do both was like re-learning how to ride a bike, difficult to start with some falls, but back to full strength in due time.
The writing and beat creation phase of this album went hand in hand. When I started writing the lyrics for the album, I really didn’t give myself any directions on what to write, and for once, I actually wrote more songs based on real-life experiences that I had gone thru since the last album. Ever since the last album, things had changed drastically, and it became obvious that the next project I worked on should reflect those changes. So from late March to early June, the album was in the building stages, with a lot of the beats being made first as a blueprint, with the lyrics being written soon after. After this phase was completed, the next part was to actually get into the studio and flesh out these songs.
Of course, this time around, I really wanted to make an album that didn’t seem like crappy demo recording, so I enlisted in the help of an old-friend, Chris D’Amico (of Detour 45), to produce the album. To be honest, he was the one who convinced me to come back, and he was the one who also managed to get me focused on making this album. So obviously, big time props go out to him, because he pretty much reminded me of who I was, and brought out my full potential. Without him, this album would have never happened.
I hope you enjoy this album and get a memorable experience from it, because when I was making it, I got quite a lot of them. Hopefully, if the stars align, you’ll get to hear some of these songs performed live, or maybe see a music video for one or two songs. Thanks for your continued support, because of you, this album is a reality, rather than a daydream.
-MC Larny
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