Album Progress

"Hey, let's spend 21 straight days making an album!  It will be easy and fun!"

Well, OK.  It's not easy.  FECK no.  SO MUCH WORK.  ARGH.

Wormley, Leroy, Druzil, WORK WORK WORK

You see that?  The musicians in the room will know how bizarre this photo is.  That's three instrumentalists playing their (very complex) parts in the same room at the same time.  If one of them messes up, it's on the recording for good.  No edits.  No digital magic.  Just DIDDLY BITS played STRAIGHT AND TRUE.  And a fine collection of diddlers they are. 

(side note: the best thing said by a diddler so far is "man, we really nailed those triplets."  Uh, yeah, I bet you did.  You dirty bastards.)

But really, now that it's starting to take shape, we are really, really proud of the album and of what (we think) we will be achieving in making it.  It's easily the most diverse recording we've ever made.  There's our usual folk-punk madness that harkens back to Legends Never Die.  And there's a cider punk song.  And there's a country song.  And there's a balkanbeats song that sounds like it's straight out of Goran Bregovic's set, featuring musicians from Italy and Serbia.  There's an insane Godspeed! You Black Emperor bit that rolls into something that sounds like the Last of the Mohicans, there are three-part anthems that pay homage to Queen, there's a spoken word bit, there's a wild and crazy polka, there's a tune that blends bluegrass and Bad Religion, and even one that sounds like Radiohead and Pink Floyd had a baby with tom waits and an accordion.

The point is: even if it sucks, and even if no-one likes it, we are quite sure that there is no album like it, anywhere, period.  At many points, we have stopped, looked at each other, and said something like: "Jesus, are we really going to do this?"  And each time, we have recalled a phrase that has served us so well, one that has got us through some really dark times and which has unerringly pointed the way forward:

"Let it ride."

That is how a squiddly do.