The forthcoming album released under my musical pseudonym ‘The Light Dreams,’ will be entitled Tricks of the Light.
It has been a longer and slower process than usual between getting this project into shape and the release of my previous album Aspects, which hit download and streaming services back in February 2022. Much of the inspiration for the new music – including the title – came to me while traveling round Iceland in late March last year. I knew there and then, that majestic trip would eventually feed into my music, resulting in several pieces of music directly inspired by the land of fire and ice. The other tracks in the project are more metaphorical and reflective, building on the same kind of style as Aspects, which has proven to be my most popular release to date. So while the album is part travelogue and part introspective and dreamy, all the tracks sit together nicely.
I created my first demos for Tricks of the Light back in the summer of 2022, but couldn’t get anything going properly. I felt I had made my strongest work to date with Aspects (and the streaming figures are testament to this, at least by my standards), so following that up proved to be challenging. I knew how I wanted things to sound and I knew the kind of direction some of the tracks should go in, but for whatever reason, I just couldn’t get it right. The first few months of 2023 were written off due to a badly slipped disc, and as I discovered, you simply can’t create while you’re in pain or doped up on heavy medication! I was starting to see light at the end of the tunnel by the end of April, and it was then that I composed Binary Star, which kickstarted the whole project and was released as a single in August.
Working on Binary Star led to me going through the 20+ ideas and starting points I had amassed over the past year, and in one instance, even working on an unfinished piece which dated back to 2013. It suddenly became clear which ideas had potential and were ready to be developed further. Eight tracks soon became ten, and I’m now in the final stages of refining the mixes and also starting think about cover art. Making music is never something that can be forced, and like any form of creativity, when the time comes, it just flows.
Watch this space…
In the meantime, here are some clips of some of the work-in-progress:
The Light Dreams 