Angels And One Armed Jugglers: An album about heartbreak and its consolations. Ambitious, whimsical, poetic, rocking.
Click above to hear “Raining Again” from the new album.
I’m making this record from a clear vision of a bitingly beautiful, sweet, tough, loose but tight album with crisp, rich production using the best musicians and personnel in the world.
We’ve set out to frame melodic, lyrical songs with artistic, masterful accompaniment that draws the ear to the words and the singing. The song selection is a balance of delicate, sung poems with acoustic guitar, contrasted by more rhythmic, rocking pieces.
See…
I have a hell of a lot of skin in this project already. I’ve recorded the basic tracks and a lot of the accompanying music at my own expense with some of the greatest musicians known to exist.
Roman Klun and I are co-producing. I worked with him on the Spin Doctors record, If The River Was Whiskey. He’s musical, intuitive, a great listener, and a great engineer. He’s an Oscar winner, a Grammy nominee and he looks at me funny when I’m on the wrong track. I like him.
Next I’m going to add orchestrations to some of the songs with the help of Henry Hey’s arranging genius: Violin, viola, cello, brass and reeds… Dude. It’s going to be gorgeous. The great Johnny Dinklage, first violin at “Hamilton”, heading up the strings, and slide trumpet master, Steven Bernstein leading the horns.
Then few more guitar parts, some vocals, and the recording will be done.
After that it’s mixing, mastering, artwork, manufacturing and all of the expenses and minutiae that go into fully realizing a record album.
Hey.
I’ve decided to Kickstart this record as much to build a community as to fund the record in a way that will give me complete artistic freedom. I come from an old school, twentieth century model of record making. It took me a while to come around to the concept of crowd funding but when I realized the value it adds to the experience for the artist and the supporters alike, a light turned on in my head.
Look.
In my mind, I’ve always had an ongoing dialogue with the “fans” anyway. When I’m recording and writing, there’s always a part of my brain that’s reaching forward toward a future listener.
Crowd funding gives the artist and the supporters a real live, actual conduit for that exchange to take place, partly through the updates and stuff and partly through the rewards that give supporters precedence in line to get limited edition stuff and cool experiences that are related to the project.
Once I realized that, rather than begging, it’s a way to give the people that want most to help the opportunity to do just that and to thank them by rocking their world with stuff nobody else is gonna get, I knew I wanted to put myself out there and try crowdfunding.
A lot of you have been with me since I was just starting out.
Thank you.
When you’re making something ephemeral like music, you are a sort of servant. You wake up in the middle of the night to write things down or play the same measure of music over and over again. I assure you, this is my life. I’ve devoted myself over and over to this craft.
I’m a vassal to the holy covenant of the ticket and the microphone and I’m making this record for both of us.
The biggest challenge when making a record is having to redo stuff. Sometimes you don’t quite capture the essence of the song or the electricity that makes a recording come alive. I’ve factored that possibility into the budget. I’m feeling pretty confident that we’ve found a process and a groove with the tracks we’ve done so far but the fact remains that some tunes are a little hard to nail down.
International shipping: It’s really expensive. I’m going to cover it for the $150 rewards and up but if cover it for the lower rewards, I wont have money left to make the record.
I feel like we’re in pretty good shape on this project. I’ve got Popcorn Custom Products working with me on the packaging and the fulfillment, Soundstage Direct, VPI turntables, and Furnace Pressing like, the Holy Trinity of vinyl are on board. Henry’s working on the musical arrangements even as I type. Roman and I have a clear vision of what we’re trying to do and we have the best musicians alive. All the basic tracks are in the can. I’m some days in the studio away from having the record recorded.
The fact remains that this is art. Not to be pretentious but we’re making something out of nothing and sometimes what looks pretty good on paper doesn’t quite work in the real world. Then you have to redo stuff, like I said. Upon successfully funding this project, I have leeway for that.
Frankly, I’m terrified of screwing this up. I’ve never been directly in charge of the whole shebang before. There’s no label… As a lot of you know, my manager is a stuffed Bunny. If something goes sideways, it’s on me. The good news is, I’ve been doing this a long time. I love making records. I used to make them on tape that cost $250 a reel. I think about this album in the middle of the night and right when I wake up in the morning. I have a light in my guts telling me I’m on to something and though every record you make offers it’s riddles and it’s stones in the road, that’s the work I live for and the idea of having you in on all of that is a thrill. I make these records for you anyway. I’m glad to have you along.
Your furry pal,
Chris.