R3CORD1NG5
Here
follows a rundown of all the recording sessions as laid down by F8. © Flamedrop Productions 1997 - 2001 |
The Soul And The Flesh (2017) |
A Star Is Miscarried (2000) |
Addictions (1999) |
Pronounced: FATE (1998) |
a D8 with F88 (1997) |
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F8 - THE SOUL AND THE FLESH The beautiful nude cover art is a charcoal drawing by the talented Vernon Swart - www.vernonswart.co.za Logo and cover design by Paul Blom 1. Chisty Mack (explicit) Some prefer the quiet, prude housewife; many light up at the thought of a brainy lady where curves don't matter; the unassuming and underestimated fuller figure; athletic; supermodels are an eternal favourite; or the timeless movie starlet... No-one can tell you what your definition of "hot" should be. If this agrees with you, welcome to the club. If you're offended, you're in the wrong place(!) When creating a homage song, where does one start? Who? What? Where? Just let it rip and see what comes out the other side!
Sometimes you only need a minute to get to the point. Recommended accompanying viewing:
While adding a short synth piece to the end of the song Diskonnekt (on the F8 release A Star Is Miscarried), even though there was no time to play around, Paul felt the urge to do so. Put on some good headphones, administer some HypnoGel, lie back and take a Tekno-Grind trip through the universe. (Part of the song title revealed itself as a result of something about its mood reminding Paul of a Cape Town club from the early-'90s, 'Gel' - the hypnotic groove of the song expanded it thusly). Recommended accompanying viewing:
The third Drone chapter builds the rhythmic journey further with on-the-fly live percussion layers. Recommended accompanying viewing:
Self-appointed moral guardians, and those who believe they have a grasp on the scriptures and as a result "authorized" to condemn whomever they feel are committing sins of whatever kind, can go fuck themselves. Recommended accompanying viewing: For the most part we are always bound by the structure, mathematics and eternal beat of music, slave to the internal metronome and click-track (whether listening or creating it). This can also be an exercise in imagination as to see what these sounds conjure up in your mind's eye. A David Lynchian segue? The collected sounds were sequenced around 2004 and the (very seldom used) fretless bass guitar got pulled out to record those bits (in May 2017), trying hard not to play a distinguishing tune or rhythmic pattern. Recommended accompanying viewing: |
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(2000) [Recorded in 2000 with some additions in 2017] These two analog tracks are on the lo-fi side, but laced with mood. The cover image is by renowned South African artist (and Paul's school art teacher in the 1980s!) Vernon Swart - www.vernonswart.co.za Logo and cover design by Paul Blom 1. imPERFECTION This one consist only of bass guitar tracks layered on a 4-track analog recorder. The bass FX unit used for the delay (which in effect becomes the beat / rhythm) is an Applied Research & Technology Bass Command Center. While in Johannesburg in the late-'90s, Paul acquired this unit from Sugardrive's bassist Gavin Wienand. His large boot soles didn't play along with the one inch foot buttons, so he traded it with Paul for a PlayStation racing game box set! Recommended accompanying viewing: We are the personification of duality. Recommended accompanying viewing: A feeling? An emotion? An acronym? a.c.h.e. is another of the salvaged F8 demo tracks from 2000 (with a programmed looped Roland beat and bass guitar layers). This year Paul met Sonja, his future wife and co-conspirator in projects including Terminatryx. The track is a melancholic trip reflecting the other side once the party's over. Recommended accompanying viewing: The continuation of the brain washing Drone rhythm now has you passing through a wormhole... What do you want to be on the other side? Warning! : If in a specific state you lock into this, once the song ends, your heart could stop! Recommended accompanying viewing: |
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(1999) [Recorded 1999] ReBeFa (Religion / Belief / Faith) They are all pretty self explanatory and the listener can gleam from it, or project onto it what they may. Some elements reflect the mood of these addictions from ominous to elated, while for instance the mission with a track like "MoGreGa" was to create the cheapest, crappiest song possible, and "DeOpDoCo" to spin off the rails. Believing people are free to choose their own destinies and battles, while neither an indictment or praising any of these, it merely adds a sound to them. While it is all digital, it has a grit to it, partially because it was not a file transfer or USB linked device, but rather recorded via analog into the DAW (digital audio workstation). Logo & cover design by Paul Blom One can be addicted to more than substances. Many are addicted to Religion (of any denomination) as they long for salvation or feel the need to follow a righteous path, get entrapped by their own beliefs (whether it has good or bad intentions) resulting in it leading to detrimental actions, and faith is something anyone can hang onto, even when they know a situation is futile. These things make us human. Recommended accompanied viewing: Not everyone has fallen in love, and many abstain from sex, but even the most pious of self-appointed holy men have felt lust. Recommended accompanied viewing: I can't consider myself a full-blown socialist, but I've always felt uncomfortable with too many aspects of the capitalist system. The overwhelming majority of most movies have some kind of monetary goal at its core, but recommended accompanied viewing include: These are the more obvious of the addictions. Recommended accompanied viewing: A broad one. If you're on the edge, this may push you closer to insanity(!) Recommended accompanied viewing: |
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(1998) [Recorded 1998] Early 1998 Hennie of Way Cool Records commissioned three F8 tracks for the Way Cool compilation CD (the label releasing local alternative acts like Pothole, Hog Hoggidy Hog and 7th Breed). Retrieving these songs after all these years was not easy. Initially this material was backed up onto DAT tape (a digital tape format from the '90s), and like the CDs it was also stored on, these deteriorated over the years! Logo and cover design by Paul Blom "These Hands" takes a cold, hard look at domestic violence, an analysis of hands, their potential to do good, and bad, intentions often so promising but falling apart in a flash. Recommended accompanying viewing: "Surfin's Tha Word" is a surfing tune by someone who's never surfed a day in his life! This parody tale chronicles the anguish of a closet surfer stuck up-country in a dry corporate metropolis. The song was created as a homage to friend Honest Gav (Gavin Rabinowitz) who has a love of SKA-Punk flavoured music. Recommended accompanying viewing: "Narcoma" is a 'love song' directed at a beloved in a narcotic coma - a serious, powerful, heartfelt other side of the F8 coin. Recommended accompanying viewing: "Handmade Apocalypse" scrutinizes the human race and its idiotic self-destructive urges. A global outcry. Another less frivolous subject, F8 can cover anything from social and political issues to silly and mundane. The punky beat of this song also punches into some double bass drum action. Recommended accompanying viewing: "Drone [v 1.0]" consist of a throbbing programmed drum assault to be expanded, improved and upgraded indefinitely. At the one F8 live show ever (thus far) in 1998 as part of the SL Magazine sponsored Oppi Koppi festival Battle Of The Bands, the track's full potential was realized when Paul was joined on stage by Lithium drummer Simon and Springbok Nude Girls guitarist Theo to layer live percussion over the Drone track. Warning! : If in a specific state you lock into this, once the song ends your heart could stop! Recommended accompanying viewing: Back to the silly - this is NOT a disco track. Recommended accompanying viewing: "SexHex" represents the only Afrikaans track on "Pronounced: FATE". Its first incarnation was "Sexwitch", conceived with Jules a year earlier. But the basic idea linked to a scene from a classic '80s movie got expanded into an entirely different animal The Afrikaans spelling would be "Seks Heks" so coincides phonetically. Tongue-in-cheek and depraved without being (too) crude. This is one of the only F8 tracks ever to get an official release as part of the "Kopskoot!" heavy Afrikaans compilation album (translated: Headshot!) Recommended accompanying viewing: Within this minute, someone is being raped, a loved one murdered, a child, spouse or slave labourer abused, people starving, freezing, neglected, abused, contracting HIV... There are 60 minutes in an hour, 1440 in a day, 43200 in a month... you can do the math... what are you going to do about it? When there's a tragedy, we observe a minute of silence. That means we should be doing so all day long...(!) Originally this was a completely silent track, but when a thunderstorm cloud burst hit in the midde of a ape Town drought, it seemed very apt to record and use it in stead of no audio (which will blow over the listener unless this info is read, or have someone think the track's defective). Recommended accompanying viewing: |
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(1997) [Recorded 1997] With V.O.D (Voice Of Destruction) on hold, the members on different continents, drummer Paul got itchy to create some tunes. Hence he became Pablo Priest, venturing into a musical realm completely dependent on his input alone - no pressure or obligation to stick to a certain sound, style, genre or identity. Neighbours aside, the volume had to be cranked. Drum patterns were programmed & run, the rest pretty much improvised over it. Just the simplistic idea of a main riff became the basics, Jules punching in sample soundFX & Vern belching vocals and Paul adding screams where it was deemed fit (ie. anywhere!). But the lo-fi psychosis, chaos-with-a-semblance-of-structure resulted in "!!speeed!!", "Dr Faustus", "Karnival DeGrind" and "Vernie Get Me A Drink" becoming the definitive first tracks to comprise A D8 WITH F8. Pablo's symmetry obsession when it comes to logo design (see his V.O.D and Terminatryx logos), the balanced F and 8 combo was obvious, and got realized in these very early days. Logo and cover design by Paul Blom Recommended accompanying viewing: One of the many movies Paul brought back from the UK (on VHS!) in 1997 included Jan Svankmajer's brilliant "Faust". Recommended accompanying viewing: The first F8 recordings / mess-abouts / improvising usually went down on a Saturday at Bloem Street, and was usually accompanied by (controlled) bouts of party nectar. In this situation, Paul's drink was finished and he decided to request Werner (aka Vernie) to replenish and rectify the situation, while recording! Recommended accompanying viewing: Paul programmed a silly beat to go with an up-tempo little riff (on the distorted bass guitar, of course). Recommended accompanying viewing: |
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