Nik Furious: Brilliant Shower: Speechless
Brilliant Shower artwork by Shawn Atkins
I fell asleep while I was recording Speechless. In fact, I didn't even realize I was recording the song at the time. All I knew was that it was 2 AM and I simply couldn't keep my eyes open any longer.
See, I'd laid down 10 minutes of funky electronic drums. But I was having a hard time coming up with a melody for the beat. I decided to improvise an extended jam on top of the drums. My plan was to relisten to the recording and cherry pick the best moments of the performance to create loops for a rap track.
Well, that never happened. I listened to the recording over and over again -- for years, really -- trying to find the best parts to loop into a beat. But somewhere in the process of relistening to the song, I began to really enjoy it as a work of its own.
Speechless was raw and improvisational, capturing the moment instead of trying to fit riffs into a tight structure. I really appreciated the free qualities of the song.
INTERMISSION! Speechless on SoundCloud:
And before I even realized it, I was copying my accidental recording style to make new songs. I'd construct a 15 minute drum loop and lay a few raw tracks over it. That's how Purple Suite and RAW both came to be.
So despite the fact that Speechless was an accident, I learned to cherish the way it was created. Nowadays, most of my songs are built with the Speechless method. Eventually, some get shaved down into tighter sections while others retain their spontaneous qualities and remain just as they were performed.
NEXT: Digital drums built for an abandoned ditty about street food set in 6/8 time become their own musical beast.
