'Lightless', my first album with Australian 'supergroup' Vipassi is out now on all streaming services and as a Physical Vinyl/CD release! This is my favourite album I've worked on so far.
I recorded my parts in May 2021, during the pandemic, and now the album is finally out on all streaming services, download and physical through Season of Mist!
I joined Vipassi while touring with Virvum in 2018, supporting Australian band Ne Obliviscaris. Vipassi is the side project of Dan Presland and Benjamin Baret of Ne Obliviscaris and they were kind enough to ask me to join when they saw me playing - and Dan was also filling in on drums for Virvum, so he was playing 2 sets each night (the man's a machine)!
The album has what I like to consider as my most 'mature' playing, in the context, and is all-instrumental tech-death with some of the most interesting and atmospheric harmony that I've been asked to play on. I've been listening to the rough mixes of this for years and still don't get bored. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do! This is my 'airplane album' that I like closing my eyes and listening to on flights.
Six months before I started recording the album, one of my bass heroes Sean Malone of Cynic sadly passed away. In an interview, I read that he had been a big fan of Mick Karn (Japan) who had skipped my attention, but who I then massively got into and noticed he sometimes recorded some of his basslines in stereo. So on this album I also have a couple of parts recorded in stereo (can you spot them?) and the album is my favourite mix so far, regarding my bass tone, as it's very close to my organic recorded bass tone. I'm also very loud!
The beginning little lick of my solo in Phainesthai is an homage to Malone's solo on the track 'Textures', from Cynic's debut album Focus. Both of my solos (see BTS below) were improvised, and then I relearnt and re-recorded them because I wasn't too keen on how I ended the solos in my improvised takes.
Dan Presland recorded all of his drums in single takes, with no drop-ins, and with the sound of the microphones on the drums only - no sound replacement. I then recorded the album without a click track, just to the guitars and drums as a single track, to give the album the most 'live' and organic feel possible. It's the first time I've added all the songs for a whole album into one single Cubase session with the grid set to time - so no tempo grid markings.
I was lucky enough to go to Australia for a couple of weeks in August/September 2023 to shoot some videos - including some playthroughs which will be released over the coming months. Watch this space for a bass transcription book also!
I recorded all the tracks with my Carillion 6-string fretless in passive mode with Bartolini pickups and Rotosound RS66 roundwound strings, straight into my Focusrite interface.
I hope you enjoy it! Do you have a favourite track?
Best wishes,
Arran
The album was recorded in 2021, but came out in 2024. The below playthrough is using the audio we recorded during this filming session in the studio when we met in August 2023 - the first time we'd all ever been in a room together!
BTS Bass solo recordings:
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