Love it.

Excited for this album aren't you Willie? ;)

AOTY

Ha ha. Is it that obvious?

ve shall see how this album turns out

The audio samples of the entire album sound very promising.

I hope that there will be a stream for this album.

I don't think there will be. Kenn seems very protective of his work. He doesn't want to do promos because of the (very real) potential of leaks. It's his first released work in over 20 years and based on the on-again-off-again Anacrusis reunion, it doesn't seem like it was an easy process. He definitely wants to make sure that this new music is released exactly how he wants it... and who could blame him?

Sorry for the multiple parts, but my "comment was too long" (nothing new there, haha)

Willie, as I think Matt from Tribunal/Divebomb is fond of streaming most of the albums on their website (and he's asked me about doing this one). I just don't want the album fully leaked because it takes all the excitement out of a new release. You and I both know it takes about 10 minutes for it to be on every torrent site. That's the world we live in now. It isn't about money or anything like that since I basically gave the album to Divebomb just to get decent distribution and aside from the limited number of signed pre-sale copies I'll make nothing at all for something I have put thousands of hours (years really) into. It truly is a labor of love.

I am very proud of the album and it definitely was not an easy one to make. It was mostly like pulling teeth (and hair) to get the band into doing it, which is what I had wanted. Too much of "me" in it for them, I suppose and that's fine because it is a bit too personal for a true Anacrusis album anyhow. The process was not unlike the way things were always done in the past, but things change after 20 years. Everyone wants to be a cook now and my kitchen is already full at this point. ;-) There is definitely some input from John and Mike, even though only John plays on a handful of songs. I was open to their input for sure, but we couldn't get it moving. I knew it was never going to happen because I like to do things a certain way and it wasn't going well. It never would have happened at all. I even considered splitting the album in half and doing one "Anacrusis" CD and one "solo" CD and lots of other things, but doing it all myself ultimately made more sense and I am more free musically and lyrically this way which makes the songs what they really should be rather than shoe-horning them into some "Anacrusis" mold. There is a pretty huge variety of styles across almost 30 songs and to me none of them are "filler". I really feel every single song is as strong as any other in its own way. I have released some of the more melodic stuff at this point, but there is a good measure of faster stuff and even some thrash/speed metal tunes. I haven't recycled anything from the old band and even on the thrash stuff I didn't want to just lift a bunch of tired old riffs we've all heard a million times. Even those songs will have surprises. Someone commented about pulling out every unreleased Anacrusis track or something like that. There ARE no unreleased Anacrusis tracks aside from a couple of old songs from the demo days that we never used. There is barely a note of Anacrusis music on this album (I think there's only one very old riff that I never got around to using), though some older material (the Telling Skies & Beside Myself from 1994) was written during the end of or just after Anacrusis.

We live in the information age and you get to hear the love, hate, criticism and praise immediately now even when people have very limited actual information. As any Anacrusis fan knows, it is very difficult to sum up the band with any single song. Maybe it takes 2 or 3 or 10 to give someone an accurate picture. That's the challenge with releasing little samples of something as huge as this album. There is orchestral metal, thrash, doom, dark, slow stuff and even some quasi-acoustic material. Where do you start? Which song will give the correct impression? I could have put one of the thrash songs up for the handful of people who still gauge "good" by looking at the speedometer, but that would be a far less accurate picture of what the album is. I could have posted the last track which is only guitar and vocals with no bass or drums or screaming at all and then what the hell would people have thought the album was going to sound like? That is why I posted 40 minutes of "samples".

No one is more anxious to get this album "out there" than I am. I've heard it a million times by now and
it becomes harder and harder to hear it as something "fresh". How many people can record 20 year old music
and make it sound like it isn't 20 years old? or 8 years or 2 even? That is the challenge. I am usually
sick of most albums long before I have listened to them anywhere near this many times, but I believe in
this music very much. I write for myself first and if others like it, that's great. I would never release
anything that I wasn't proud of. That's not ego talking, that's just my approach. No one's gonna get a
platinum album or Grammy out of this and even smaller labels aren't all that interested in releasing
albums by 46 year old guys with no band and zero interest in touring. This music is for me and the fans
who like what I do (and who wanted something more after S&W). To approach it any other way in 2014 would
be more depressing than I can imagine.

And don't worry "Willie"...you'll hear it before most people, I promise you that. ;-) Flattery DOES still
get you somewhere these days, haha. Seriously, you've written some stellar stuff about us and I appreciate
it. I know you are not only a true fan, but someone who can express his likes and dislikes and explain why
when you review an album. I'm actually dying to read your review, not because you are an ass-kisser, but
because I know if anyone will "get it" it will be you. Keep in touch and we'll work it out, even if it is
just downloading a copy from me for review since that's how we'll probably be handling it (though that is
unfortunately an imperfect picture of the album).

Anyhow, thanks to the rest of you for all the great comments on the new material.

That's awesome. Thank you for the clarification and a little incite into your thought process for the whole thing. It's definitely a shame that John Emery couldn't participate more because I'm definitely a fan of his style and it gave Anacrusis a certain 'flair'. As far as streaming the album and promos, it's totally understandable to want to give the first release in 20 years a flawless introduction. And thanks for the kind words, I'm actually dying to hear the album and write the review ;)

John is a great bassist, but don't worry because I always wrote most of the baselines and lifted the tone from NMA so nothing
has changed here. That bass style and sound is all over this album ;-) the only difference is that instead of teaching the bass
parts to John I just played them myself.

whoa awesome

Not to take anything away from John of course, but it would have been note for note either way and there are even some
different styles that he wasn't as comfortable with so it worked out better this way.

Well then... Crisis averted, ha ha. Cause that was one of the things I was kinda bummed about -- missing those baselines.

Freakin' iPad keeps changing 'basslines' to 'baselines'.

Baseball on its mind, Haha

I was 100% responsible for the bass-sound and making it a lead melodic instrument in the band. That would never change for me.

Definitely glad to hear it.