The Amplifucker by Killick
The Amplifucker is 18 further explorations in my Appalachian Trance Metal songbook. The goal for this project was to capture the interior and exterior life of my 18-stringed acoustic instrument called the H'arpeggione, a.k.a. Devil Cello. I went for maximum transparency across an extremely wide dynamic range, from whisper quiet to all get-out. It was all recorded live, first takes, with no edits or overdubs. The H'arpeggione is naturally soft-spoken, and after years of trial and error, engineer Tom Lewis and I arrived at our recording solution: four microphones, a contact mic, a pickup, two amplifiers, and then the whole lot was run through a p.a. speaker and that too was recorded. All the signals were then blended in the mix. Some moments are the most intense sounds of acoustic musical instrument origin I've ever heard, pushing the physical limits of (myself and) the H'arp. The title The Amplifucker refers to the ambiguity between "acoustic" and "electric," as we're typically dealing with both in most musical presentations, despite any marketing concepts to the contrary. It's also a musing on post-electricity creativity, and I hope fun and sexy, something sometimes painfully absent in "serious" music. Song titles include Beautifficult, Mouthbereaver, Symbol Grab, Not A Could In The Sky, and many other challenges to grammar and spell checkers everywhere...
released 01 August 2008
recorded by Tom Lewis 3.09.08 at John Keane Studios, Athens GA
mixed by Tom Lewis and Killick 3.10.08 at Chase Park Transduction, Athens GA
recorded by Tom Lewis 3.09.08 at John Keane Studios, Athens GA
mixed by Tom Lewis and Killick 3.10.08 at Chase Park Transduction, Athens GA