Every morning, I'd wake to the sound of JT and Andy walking through the
front door of my rented, hundred-year-old house on Grantland Avenue in
Nashville. Jumping out of bed as quickly as possible, I'd greet them,
wiping the sleep from my eyes, pretending to have been awake for hours.
Their creativity seems to get them out of bed in the morning, whereas
mine tends to keep me from getting into bed
at night! After some coffee in the morning, courtesy of Gavin, we'd
dive into recording, waking any unsuspecting, sleeping roommates in the
process. We borrowed microphones and instruments from friends around
town, creating a laundry list of favors which we still have yet to
return. In between working day jobs and appeasing complaining
neighbors, we wrote songs, d e c o n s t r u c t e d them, then
reassembled them together in new ways. Nothing was sacred.
The
Grantland house, itself, is very inspiring and when we were given the
opportunity to record in "real" studios a few months later, we politely
declined, knowing that no studio could ever replicate what we had at
that house. The importance environment played in the inspiration and
creation of Absence cannot be overstated. During the course of
recording, our house developed such a reputation around town that other
bands and artists began to use our house as well. Grantland quickly
became somewhat of an artistic hub, with music coming out of all rooms,
paintings and drawings hung on every wall, and people writing lyrics on
the porch or in the backyard. On any given night, there could be a
house show, an art exhibition, or a film crew using the house as a set.
Ideas seem to be in the walls, in the wood floors and on the porch of
this old house. With a little luck and attentiveness, we'd tap into
that creative energy and capture it. With the few microphones we had,
we recorded as much as possible, including one time when we sent JT
outside during a rain storm to record vocals (which we do not
recommend)!
Not surprisingly, recording at the Grantland
house was beginning to take a toll on our neighbors, so we decided it
would be best to take all of our gear to a remote location to finish the
album. We stumbled upon a large house in Nunnelly, TN-about an hour
west of Nashville. I don't think it is on the map, actually. Nunnelly
is a tiny town and the house we found had no cell phone service or
internet access-the perfect environment to focus on the task we set
before ourselves.
We had a difficult time picking an album
title that tied everything together, but the title Absence seemed to fit
best. Whether it be a vacant lover, the loss of a family member, or
wrestling with God, we felt like this was really an album full of
internal examination and questioning. Since then, we've slowly learned
some answers, but with more answers come new questions, and with new
questions, hopefully, comes new music.
So when you hear Absence,
you are hearing Andy, Gavin, JT and myself coming together, figuring
out how to make an album for the first time. You are hearing drums in
the living room...guitars in a bathroom, and vocals in the bedroom. We
made this album ourselves. I recorded it and mixed it in my bedroom
while JT did the album artwork. We trust that despite the
imperfections, and maybe because of the imperfections and flaws, you
hear the four of us trying to best capture something internal and
convert it to something external. This album is for those that stumble
upon it and claim it as their own, just as we have.
-Chad
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