the work on "entertain" started a few days after the production of "altered stems" which was the collaboration with sven piayda by the principle of "sing my song" which means each one is recording a different version of a track created by the other. while working on "altered stems" i already noticed that working together works out well between sven and me and it is double the fun working together on fresh ideas. the coproduction was done in a personal new record time where the core doing the tracks took only 11 days.




sven was busy doing the underestimated work on mastering, album assembly and artwork while we still were on lockdown conditions means there was plenty of time you could spend with music.




i began to write fresh own material and tracks und had a pool of 5 to 6 tracks assembled in no time, which seemed to be a good match at that time. a few of these early track versions i did share to the group or friends on facebook. the titel of the album was pretty early and influenced by the condition these days, which is explained on the booklet of the cd.


we were in june and the lockdown restrictions were mostly gone. doing the recordings for "altered stems" we already had the consent that as it will be possible we will have a beer on the spontaneous creation. the date of release for "altered stems" seemed to be the perfect occasion for this and we planned to met up in a beer garden with perfect sunny weather for our reward. well unfortunately more people had the same idea and there was no chance to get a seat. in reality it became a heineken on a long and sunny evening from the nearby kiosk sitting on the wall of the marketplace.

we talked about a lot of topics on the "release beer evening" - one of them was me mentioning the work on the new album. another one was that organic sound influence can have a big impact on electronic music. finally sven offered this time i will have the hat on and he will be contributing some material and check out where the road may lead us.

next day i uploaded all material that seemed to be near done. some of the early tracks have been kicked out due to better material developed in the project. some of the survivors are e.g. "tango with esperanza" or "afterlife".




i had been absolutely curious for our first recording session und i was thinking we would do one track that evening - it were four and i was fascinated how directional and quick sven delivered content it was near stressful to follow with recording and labelling tracks. after the first recording session the editing of the material came up which took up to three days as on every later session. first problems appeared and i learned a lot from that: on open sounding tracks like "afterlife" it ain't a problem but on compact sounding like "last song" in the end it did not sound well at all.

working together with sven is like that: if something ain't good - he will tell you and that is perfect for me. to explain the problem in simple words: if a shelf is full and you want to put something additional in - you have to remove something before. initially i was hesitating trying to eq some space in - later i did it more radical: listen track - identify irrelevant tracks and parts - delete them.

the problem continued through the project because most of the tracks where pretty crowded by original design and that is the reason why some of the tracks are bearing the internal revision number 15. that is the point where you find out where a collaboration works or not as it takes patience - criticism and acceptance of criticism.


without going too far into details "afterlife" for me is a special track nobody would search for an an electro album and "entertain" ain't an electro album below the line. after recording the guitars for the song some - i call them "u2 suspicious" vibes came through. adding bass and accoustic drum part made it a new song. the original plan was to have one or two tracks lifted that way on the album - half way i did realize it would not be spicy to have a lot of thin cold synth tracks besides the lifted up material so the plan was changed: more guitars!

more recording sessions and new tracks followed and besides little rituals like having a short team briefing without a computer befor each session we began to develop more routine because you gain an understanding of the other ones intention and thoughts over time.

"last song" and "wearing winter" originally appeared on the last digital release of me but i like the new versions that much that they get their space on "entertain". "blackland" is an even older track originally written for the first live-gig in the macroscope in 2019 but due to the 15 minute time limitation i had no chance to play it. "what about" was written for the "electric-cafe sampler" but i have been the only one contributing a track by now so it was pimped and became a real cool mixture of 80's disco sound meets nirvana i wouldn't have expected to match.




this time it was hard to find the spot where you are satisfied and think: "that is the best album i can do at the moment - that's it!" and end of september the mastering was done pretty smooth within three days. it ain't easy to assign "entertain" to a music genre or say: "hey the album sounds like..." - my best try to describe it is a symbiosis of handplayed and digital instruments homed in different styles.

even on artwork i got start-up support and input from sven - as mentioned before sometimes it needs a good mind telling you in the right words: that is not really good and shows you directions. thanks for all your help - creative input and patience, without you the album would not be the current stand in many aspects. some of the tracks changed that much from the recorded material that it felt right to add sven to the song writing credits as they became new songs.




there are some regards to the electric cafe on the booklet - why ? simple as that - because of getting in contact with the electric cafe and the large pool of creative people i sucked in that much input that it helped me more in my process of musical development in the last two years than the twenty before.


primal scapes 'humming project' from 'entertain' (2020)
see www.primal-scapes.com


all notes off & record of tides 'care' from 'altered stems' (2020)
see www.recordoftides.com






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