After a full year in Türkiye, playing 21 shows at the four corners of my native country, in November 2022, I headed back to Mazatlan Mexico. From November to February, I gathered many ideas I had recorded on my phone during the Turkish tour.
For the new year holiday season, I went to Querétaro. Mid-January, I returned to Mazatlan, Sinaloa, and on February 14th, I went to Guadalajara, Jalisco.
Something unique happened during my stay in Guadalajara. All the ideas I had gathered started to shape into song backbones. During the two weeks, I stayed in Jalisco, I was able to put an album worth of song backbones together.
I was asked to play a show on my last day in Guadalajara. Since I had already made housing arrangements in Sinaloa, I went to Mazatlan for a week, then returned to Guadalajara to play the show.
Besides preparing for the concert with the old repertoire, I entirely focused on the writing process for the next album. It was amazing to witness how new ideas quickly materialized through my fingers. I ended up with 17 complete song backbones at one point.
Horizontal Writing Process
The reason why I could juggle that many songs at the same time was because I adopted the horizontal songwriting process. This process consists of writing a collection of different songs simultaneously. Before, I used to write songs individually and form an album with the songs I had written. With the horizontal writing technique, I aimed to write all the backbones of the album at once, then find all the vocal melodies across all songs, write all the lyrics for each song, and lay down the drums and bass arrangements on each piece.
This technique presented various challenges, mainly in simultaneously warping my head around many different song ideas and parts, but the upside was huge. Whenever I got stuck on a particular song, I wouldn’t waste time finding a solution. I would pass to a different tune and work on that song from where I had left off during the previous session. And I would repeat this approach with all the pieces in my roaster. When I’d return to the first song where I was stuck, I would immediately find a solution to move on and make progress.
I am always going toward what excites me.
Another technique I adopted during the “İsmimi Bulutlardan Aldım” writing process was always leaning towards excitement. If a song or an idea were getting boring, I wouldn’t force it and don’t hesitate to drop it; instead, I worked on ideas that excited me.
I believe I am blessed with the ability to initiate many new ideas daily. It’s a double-edged sword situation. Abundance is good but can also result in not constructing something tangible because something new and exciting always comes into the picture. As a solution, I developed an ear for differentiating the excitement solely from newness in contrast with sustainable excitement for a musical idea that adds value to Black Sea Storm.
Nomadic Studio Sessions Monterrey
By the end of April, I had a dozen song backbones that I was running live. It was time for me to leave Mazatlan again. This time, I wanted to go to a place I never visited in Mexico. I decided to go to Monterrey, Nuevo Leon.
In Monterrey, I had a chance to stay in an apartment that had good acoustics to record acoustic guitars. The downside was that the neighborhood was pretty noisy. The main door gave directly on the street. The lady renting me the place would also rent the apartment next door. There was a condemned door between the two apartments, and the noise would leak through. At one point, a lady was staying at the apartment. She was always on the phone. I could hear not only every word she was saying but also her boyfriend’s speech through her phone. I had to go through those challenges to record all the main guitars. It wasn’t easy, but I could have 11 songs in the can in a month.
Nomadic Studio Sessions Culiacan
After a month in Monterrey, I headed to the capital of Sinaloa, Culiacan. As I progressed with the recordings, I would try to rent places with acoustics in mind. In Culiacan, I rented a penthouse in the neighborhood of Tres Rios. With the penthouse situation, I hoped not to have neighbors on the other side of the walls. In Culiacan, the neighbors were not an issue, but since I was on the roof level, my apartment was surrounded by all the air conditioning ventilators. When the wind blows, It will hit the edges of the building and make some noise. A significant construction site was a block away, and on Sundays, janitors would throw a party at the health center across the street. The music will start around 6 PM and go on until two in the morning. Despite all the noise challenges, I could record all the vocals, second guitars, and drums and write all the lyrics for the album.
I was already preparing for live shows with the new material.
Besides recording the songs, I got into the habit of running the songs on the acoustic guitar. Some of the themes of the next album were technically more challenging than my previous pieces. More importantly, the vocals and the guitars needed perfect independence. Neither of them was straightforward. I knew I would need to practice a lot before getting the album material live concert ready.
For a couple of months, I envisioned the album as a collection of 11 songs. I eliminated three songs on the album during my last week in Culiacan. Not that they were bad songs. It’s just that they slowed down the flow and reduced an album’s impact on me as the listener.
I am an album listener. I like listening to albums, not individual songs or playlists. Therefore “İsmimi Bulutlardan Aldım” was designed to be listened to as an album and hopefully flow as an album.
Sonora Bass Recordings
Since I live a nomadic life, I can only take so much with me. My backpacks and suite case are packed with musical equipment for live shows and home recordings. My next record had all the tracks recorded. The missing pieces were the bass arrangements. Early this year, I read Rick Rubin’s “The Creative Act,” in this book, he says there is no excuse not to create. You got to do with what you have. And so far in the recording process, I thought I would release the album without bass guitar arrangements since I could not access a bass guitar. But the more I listened to the collection of songs, the more the bass player within me wanted to lay down the bass tracks on those songs.
I decided to call Kacho Olivares. He lives in Hermosillo Sonora. He recorded and produced “Sonora Çöl Kayıtları” of Black Sea Storm in 2021. I asked Kacho if he could lend me one of his bass guitars for a couple of weeks. He said that he would lend me his instruments without any problem. So I bought a bus ticket to go to Hermosillo from Culiacan.
I planned to stay 16 days in Hermosillo to find and record bass arrangements on eight songs. I rented a place above my means to ensure I had the best conditions to record. Kacho ended up lending me three bass guitars. I went to Salazar Guitar Garage to get set up on the bases.
In about ten days, I had all the bass arrangements in the can and the mix done.
Absolute Satisfaction
I was so proud of myself at the end of the creative process. I could record a full rock album, 100% made in Mexico, living a nomadic life, using only my stage gear and the basses Kacho lent me. For the entire album, I used an SM 57 mic that I also use on stage.
The satisfaction also came from recording the album I wanted to record, and I only kept the songs that excited me and supported the album as a whole. I threw away more material than I kept on the album.
Now I know I can produce rock albums on the road, alone. It is huge for me. I am inspired on the road, but recording calls for a sedentary life. I feel like I’ve broken that reality. I can make full-band-sounding rock albums wherever I go. I find it fantastic!
Album Release Date August 25th, 2023
The whole album will be available on all streaming platforms on August 25th. A couple of songs are already available on Bandcamp. Bandcamp is probably the best platform out there to support artists directly.