Monday, September 30, 2019

first liner note release for inri000

these are the first demos i recorded, written 1994-1996 and recorded in the second half of 1996. this corresponds to the end of my 15th year and the beginning of my grade 10 school year. on the one hand, it's an intriguing document of a socially maladjusted teenage punk. on the other hand, it's a 15 year-old kid learning how to use a recording studio (and how to play the drums). influences are displayed on my sleeve just a little too loudly at times.

i was attempting to create something that could be described by the words disturbing, schizophrenic, unique, bizarre, twisted. looking back, i think i succeeded more than i realized at the time. this is a difficult listen that would be appealing to fans of the obscurantist reaches of 80s punk and 90s grunge. i manage to maintain a strange sense of melody, though. in truth, my current adult self is somewhat impressed with my teenaged self at this current point.

that being said, it should not be forgotten that i was fifteen. i am at times rather crude, and i display a childlike understanding of certain issues. most poetry written at the age of fifteen is not particularly insightful. again, though, i surprise myself at points.

this is the first time i'm publishing these demos in any form. i've remained frighteningly self-conscious of them over the years. over the last seventeen years, the audience has been extremely limited. initial reactions suggested i take some time to perfect my performance skills, particularly my drumming skills. however, this indicated a lack of understanding of my intent in the overall sound. the playing is quite purposefully abstract with the aim of exploring mental illness.

the demos were initially dub-mastered onto a 110 minute tape that would have flipped after the eighth track. that tape was at some point recorded into a soundblaster and compressed very heavily; this is the only source of the material that i still have. so, i had to decompress the files from those 128 (or worse) kbps mp3s and run them through some digital mastering equipment in an attempt to "undo" the compression. what that is is a half-effective trick to recover data that is in actuality forever lost. nonetheless, i should point out that while these files were recorded entirely in 1996, they were substantially digitally modified in late 2013. finalized on june 26, 2016. first liner note release added on sept 30, 2019. as always, please use headphones.

i consider this an archival release with little direct listening value. i've pointed out repeatedly that i was 15. however, various segments have been isolated and pulled out for a higher listenability value over here:
jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/inricycled-a

this release also includes a printable j-card insert and will also eventually include a comprehensive package of journal entries in doc & pdf from all phases of production (1993-1996, 2013-2019). as of sept 30, 2019, the release includes a 47 page booklet that includes journal entries from the remastering process over sept-oct, 2013.
 

credits

released December 25, 1996

j - guitars, effects, bass, drums, vocals, keyboards, tapes, found sounds, percussion, production. 

https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/inri-cassette-demo-1
so, as promised, here is an example of the first run of the liner notes.

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1TybN3uKUhEH1KKD8HphcYoFc-r59NqrN

this is just a dummy file; the final result will be three or four times this length. but, considering that my music archive is now nearly 700 pages, why did i cut it down to a mere 47 pages?

a mere 47 pages? these are liner notes. back in the day, when people bought records, a 47 page booklet with digital photos would be the deluxe edition, guys.

the bulk of the writing in the music journal actually exists for the context of the aleph discs, where it will be used as the front-end for an interactive multimedia presentation. this is coming down the road. for right now, what you get is a truncated version of the journal that is relevant solely in the context of it being liner notes. if you want the full journal, it's up for download, too. 

this is one of the things that we've lost in the digital age, so what i'm doing is trying to find a way to bring that back, in a way that makes sense to people that think that physical media is an anachronism. but, they're liner notes - you don't put things like reviews of other people's work, or conversations with friends, in your liner notes. you save things like that for the actual journals.

the above document will be inserted into the following download within a few minutes, in pdf and doc form. future liner notes will not be posted in this fashion.

https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/inri-cassette-demo-1

the liner notes are also a perpetual work in progress, and they have to be. the next update will be at the finalization stage in mid-2016, which i hope to get up asap, but will also include notes published to youtube over 2014-2015, as well as other things. there will need to be a third update in 2026 (or 2027) that adds all of the loose ends, including the alter-reality posts.