Sunday, September 28, 2008

Album of the Week #46: Thru the Vent

Project name: ORC
Album name: Thru the Vent
Release date: September 23, 2008
Release format: CD
Studio name: Metal XOR Studio

ORC - Thru the Vent

Tracks:
1. Mariner's Lament
2. Pruritus
3. Chicken Quest
4. Giu
5. Brown River
6. Exquisite Blackness
7. I Wish You the Best
8. Land of Make Believe
9. HipHop HobGob
10. We Go Down
11. Here We Go

On Saturday, September 20, 2008, Jason and Jimmy connected on their computers with the Voice Over IP program called Ventrilo, as they often do. That particular night Jason had his recorder going, recording everything that was said or done by either of them.

Jason started the evening by working on music for a new project. Jimmy was also playing around with his own music. When Jason finished, he started playing an online game called Vanguard. But Jimmy kept working on music.

Behind Jason's game sounds, Jimmy was playing music and singing, making up the lyrics as he went along. After a few songs Jason joined in by singing as Jimmy played his synthesizer. After they logged off for the evening, Jason went back to the recording and pulled out eleven songs that they created that night. And those eleven songs are what became this EP.

It is a short album and hardly any thought went into it, but it is the first ORC release since their debut album in 1999, Purging the Great Abyss. Their attempt at recording a new full-length album in January of 2008 ended before the album was finished. But for this latest impromptu jam, the album was released just three days after being recorded.

The Asian theme of the packaging came from the picture used on the front of the album cover, which Jimmy had as his desktop wallpaper at work for a while. They agreed the picture should be used in some way with ORC, so when it was decided to release this as an album, they already had their album cover. The rest of the packaging followed that theme.

And the title of the EP came from the fact that the music was created over the Internet using the program Ventrilo, or Vent for short.

There are more EP's of such live jam sessions in the ORC catalog. Plans are to release more of them in 2009.

Tuesday, September 23, 2008

Studio News: ***NEW ALBUM RELEASE ***

Metal XOR Studio is proud to announce today's release of ORC

Thru the Vent


ORC - Thru the Vent

This is the first ORC release since their debut album Purging the Great Abyss from 1999. This is a short EP of eleven songs recorded in one session over the Voice Over IP program called Ventrilo. They had no intention of recording any new songs, much less an entire album, but the recorders happened to be rolling as they goofed around that night. And this is the result.

Monday, September 1, 2008

State of the Studio #13: September '08

Summer is winding down. And for that I'm thankful. I'm ready to get fall started!

Last month saw the one-year anniversary of this blog. Over the course of that year I have posted a lot of information! It took a lot of time to research, take pictures, scan documents, set up Internet resources, and especially type all the posts. It was a nice way to compile many loose ends into one organized source.

But there are also other non-musical projects always in progress at the Studio. Some of those have been neglected over the last twelve months with this blog being at the top of the priority list. But there have been a few weekly features come to a close recently and now seems to be an appropriate time to bring some of those other projects into focus.

This site will remain the hub for all Studio projects to come, musical or not. And when new websites are created they will be listed in this site's link index. And of course all musical news will still be posted here.

So what are the Studio's plans for music for the rest of the year? Two more albums: one being the first Equinox Dulcet album and the other Paige's second album. Plans are to release the Equinox CD later this month. And plans are in the works for a possible new music project. And there are a few posts that still need to be made.

This monthly State of the Studio feature will definitely continue. And there will be an occasion Listen Online song posted at the site. But posts will decrease drastically to make time for the other projects.

And after all that, see you on October 1!