MERRY CHRISTMAS and HAPPY NEW YEAR

I'm sure it comes around quicker every year. All part of getting old I suppose. I'm quite glad to see the back of 2005 really. It's been a rubbish year in many respects. Lots of bad things happening really - on a global scale. What with tsunamis in Asia and hurricanes in the USA and suicide bombers in London. And in my own little World, my dog died which was sad. And I haven't really been able to get going with new music. 2005 is the first year for 5 years I haven't released a new CD...! Too busy trying to scrape a living...

Oh well. Maybe 2006 will be better both locally and globally. I hope so.

I haven't been totally idle in 2005. I have done some new music - I just haven't finished anything. The most exciting thing has been an embryonic collaboration with Michael Allison, an extremely talented California based musician a.k.a. DARSHAN AMBIENT. Michael has been far more productive than me in 2005 having released 2 excellent CDs on the Lotuspike label. Hopefully, in 2006, we will find an outlet for our new music which is starting to sound really exciting.

OK - sneak preview time. I have made 4 demo tracks available via my website - 2 by me and 2 collaborations between Michael and myself. Visit www.deepskydivers.com to hear them.

(These are accompanied by some of my favourite photos from 2005 - featuring my family and places we have visited during the year.)

Some background info on the tracks.

1. COOKIN' ON BORROWED GAS - is my first experimentation with Ableton Live; music built around a lo-fi bass loop I recorded using my '71 Fender Musicman (a more lo-fi bass there never was). The title - well me and my mate Pete like to mix our metaphors and each morning we wake up and count our lucky chickens. This is one of Pete's and I think it is a good metaphor for 2005.
2. IMPRESSION: SUNRISE - with 3 kids, it's not often I wake up in a morning. I usually get woken up. Do you know what I mean. Anyway, "I woke up" one day in november 2005. It was a really serene morning. I watched something on TV about French impressionism. And in the afternoon I wrote the music.
3. LUMINOSITY - this was a simple 4-note piano motif. I sent it to Michael who breathed life into the music with some rhythmic and textural ideas of his own. I moved it on a little further - and that's where we are at right now.
4. BLISS DECAY - a beautiful idea from Michael which I just listened to in a loop - round and round and round - for days. I added some ideas and some percussion and kept the length down to 13 minutes. A 3-day long MP3 = lots of bandwidth.

I hope you enjoy this new music. Hopefully in 2006, we will be able to develop these ideas into a really special CD or 2.

With love & best wishes for Christmas and 2006

Jon XX