So with the recent burst of Spring-like weather in my area (Maryland/East Coast), the TFK-season has begun!
To start off, I've been rattling around remixed tracklistings for TFK's latest album, Desolation Rose. Like with other albums with bonus tracks (Space Revolver, The Rainmaker and The Sum Of No Evil), I'm trying to turn the album in to, yet another double album.
With so many tracks, and all the instrumental/segue-y pieces relegated to the "Bonus Disc" this go around, I felt like the main disc was missing those interludes, especially with how good they are, so I've taken it upon myself to re-instate them and create a 2-disc album, with each disc at about 45-46 minutes.
And for further old-time-y-ness, I made sure that each disc would feel like an vinyl LP, making sure each chunk of music would fit on a 20-25 minute side of vinyl, so there are four major chunks of music on my version of DR:
Disc 1
Tower ONE
Burning Spears
Lazy Monkey
The Wailing Wall
Dark Fascist Skies
Psalm 2013
Sleeping Bones
Desolation Road
White Tuxedos
Disc 2
The Resurrected Judas
Silent Masses
Last Carnivore
Badbeats
Runaway Train
Interstellar Visitations
Blood Of Eden
Silent Graveyards
The Final ERA
I figured "Psalm 2013" would fit great before "Sleeping Bones" since the former ends with rain/storm sounds while the latter begin with them. Putting "Burning Spears" after the opening epic made sense because the opening lyric references it and the closing chord/notes of "Tower ONE" segue nicely in to the beginning of "Burning Spears". Also, reprising "Burning Spears" from side one is the echo of it in "Paslm 2013", so there's a nice call-and-response on the first disc.
Closing the album with "The Final Era" sounded right, and cross-fading the drum roll in the fading notes of "Silent Graveyards" was easy enough, and it sounded totally natural, too. So after fitting those three bonus tracks in to the main sequence, it was a matter of filling in the rest. I needed shorter tracks to fill in "Side 1", so "Lazy Monkey and "The Wailing Wall" fit the bill. Opening "Side 2" was "Dark Fascist Skies", which seemed to fit better earlier in the album for me, at least, conceptually.
Not wanting to put another 8+ minute track on either Sides 1, 2 or 3, the instrumental "Interstellar Visitations" had to move to "Side 4" before the closing trio of tracks, and with the room left, I opened that side with "Runaway Train". This left "Badbeats", which would fit in at the end of "Side 3". I had originally wanted to open that side with it, but "The Resurrected Judas" just sounded better as an opener for the second disc.
I'm pretty satisfied with this arrangement, but it'll take a week or so of listens to get used to it. Luckily, I didn't burn myself out on the album last fall when it came out. As pain of occupation said, TFK is more of a Spring band, so I think I was subconsciously waiting til now to really give this a decent listen. It's truly a remarkable album, and a good step in the right direction from Banks Of Eden, which was pretty good, especially after a five year hiatus!
-Marc.