The work on the new Stormformer album crawls forward. Very slowly. Readers may note that previous news items promised a possible finish during 2020, but now I am certain it’s wiser not promising anything at all. It will finish when it needs to be.

Apart from the usual life disruptions, and the ongoing challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic making my work situation much worse, I have been delayed due to serious technical issues since mid 2020. I will spare the reader the full saga, but briefly I had a soundcard die on me, and then the expensive replacement has refused to place nice with my computer hardware. I’ve had nothing but glitching and audio-destruction. The support from the soundcard’s company has been reasonable, but I still have had no breakthrough. I’m at the nerd-crossroads and have to give thought to what I’m going to do about it. It has been most frustrating not being able to record anything to an acceptable professional standard. I’ve felt ‘very ready’ to get this album over and done with, but flow is not meant to be for now.

Nevertheless. I’ve been able to use the stock soundcard that comes with the computer motherboard – it’s not what you’d call professional. But it is good enough to get an output of audio that I’m able to do some mixing with. So mixing is all I’ve been able to do. I’m grateful for this. As aforementioned, I’ve been doing long mixing sweeps through the 16 tracks, burning to CD, testing in the car, and then coming back for yet another round. Each time they get a bit better, and I’m given more time to practice the vocals. Along the way I’ve added musical parts, refined parts, even taking some parts away. I’m trying to stay in touch with it the best I can, and thankfully it continues to slowly take shape.

I will write back here if I have any progress.