the core
loops involved in clarity were initially created in the late summer of
2001, with the intent of being the opening sequence in a new inri
project (with the long kicked-around working title of 'trinri'). while i
had fairly firmly put the inri moniker down around my 19th birthday
(late 1999), i was also coming out of a lengthy "serious music" phase
and was getting a desire to write in a more structured, synth-pop type
direction, as i had for years previously. this urge was happening about
the same as i was being coerced into starting a rock band with some high
school acquaintances.
around october, i started working on a separate noise project that was
meant to splice harsh electronic noise with anarchist politics. this
produced two tracks at the time, which are now available as a short
single as inri032. at the time, it wasn't clear to me where those ideas
would lead.
by november it was clear that the rock band wasn't happening, but it
turned out the singer had tastes that correlated reasonably well with
what i was thinking about creating for the trinri project. these two
projects consequently merged into rabit is wolf, and the material i was
kicking around for use in trinri ended up becoming the core of what
rabit is wolf became.
as i was recording parts for clarity, i ended up reusing ideas from the
noise project. i further reused those ideas in constructing a 2004 noise
collage for inclusion on the record that finally came out of the noise
project. both noise collages are present in order to comprehensively
explore the ideas existing within clarity.
zen was recorded with sean over december, 2001. i have chosen not to
complete a version of the wave (inri034) that was also being discussed
at the time, but would have fit into this release well, conceptually.
clarity was completed (with vocals) over january, 2002. the nature of
rabit (along with the songs i had written for it) took a sharp turn
towards folk almost immediately. this collection is consequently quite
different than the official rabit demo, which is much more
song-oriented. over the years, i've always wanted to have a rabit
release that was darker, noisier and more chaotic and am glad to have it
in the form of this ep-single, which could be viewed as a secondary
demo. put another way, this is the comprehensive representation of the
second (electro/noise/industrial) incarnation of rabit is wolf.
however, there are two factors complicating clarity as a solely rabit is
wolf production. the first is that sean was never really happy with the
result - a shame as i consider his vocal performance and lyrics to be
the best of the songs we did together. the second is that i always felt
the track was "mine" and should have had an instrumental mix. that is,
i've always regretted not saving an instrumental mix.
for these reasons, i've revisited the track as an instrumental and left
two snapshots - 11/2001 and 01/2002. this second snapshot (which is to
be considered a final mix) will also appear on my upcoming 6th record,
dated to the end of 2002.
recorded in late 2001 and early 2002. track 6 was constructed in may,
2004 out of files recorded 1999-2001. tracks 1-4 were reconstructed over
october, 2014. final mixes were finished on october 18, 2014. as
always, please use headphones.
credits:
j - guitars (electric, acoustic, nylon), mandolin,
sequencers, synthesizers, drum & melodic programming, electric air
reed organ, digital piano, flute, drum kit, sampling, digital and analog
effects processing, digital wave editing, sound design (loops, granular
synthesis, noise generators), production
sean - vocals/lyrics (3,5), harmonica (4,5)
released february 1, 2002
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/clarity
