Old Album Diaries

Gathering of 100 Supernatural Tales

Right now I’m a spider dipping her little pinkie toe out of her writing cave.
Right now I’m a ball of excited fluff
Right now the new year’s crystal ball sees singles released and album peeking second half of the year.

Summer’s here. So I’m out of my cave and gigging soon enough. First shows start in Sydney. Details as attached. Tickets can be purchased right now online.

We will be doing something special for the hot summer nights by invoking the Hyaku Monogatari, known as a gathering of 100 supernatural tales.

Where: Australia, The Sandringam, Newtown
When: Friday. 22 Feb 2008
Doors Open 8pm.

Smash – Sydney’s anime convention will also be hosting a mini Cosplay/ Karaoke competition. This translates to a cosplay invasion on a very unsuspecting pub. Mostly I can’t wait to see the faces on the regular pub goers. All this entertainment for $10 which is really less than the price of a movie ticket. (woohoo!)

For those who do not know what cosplay is. Wiki here.It is essentially people who dress up as their favourite characters on anime shows. So there, dress up, it’s halloween all over again, and for those who don’t dress up, it’s still a feast for the eyes and ears.

This gig’s a rather exclusive one. Only a limited 100 tickets are available. These things evaporate real real fast! Get them here now.

This event is proudly sponsored by

Celestial bodies take note…

note to all: If and ONLY if, on one of the Sunny days that Spidey decides to venture out of her studio and brave humanity. All religious types/ celestial bodies will do very well to keep their opinions to themselves unless humbly asked for.

Because Spidey is just as vocal about how she feels when you violate her sky-space.

*now humbly waits for attack of hatemail from humourless deity representatives

Creeeaaaakkkkkk……!!!

*Opens a creaky dusty webby like looking blog door that has been abandoned for weeks*
Hello
How’s all?

Still here?

It’s been a good coupla weeks, hasn’t it? Your royal madness had to resort to silence while the writing machines are being fired. So here I am now almost done with my demo phase of the new album. Actually, the recording of the first of 13 tracks starts in the next couple of weeks, I’m a mixture of relief and happiness.

There have been a couple of beeps from you regarding what the hell the next album is to be, and I have been silent. Some of the more enthusiastic amongst you have thrown expletives at me in frustration, at which I can only cackle.

Patience I say. It will be revealed soon. The curse of a concept album (yes concept, u heard right…old school shit) is that u don’t say u are doing one until u have finished writing most of the demo tracks and your producer likes them. This is so that your muses don’t seize up from performance anxiety and start not…performing. (Note: this is not an invitation to Viagra spammers) So here I am, mostly finished with 13 tracks, and writing more tracks in case some don’t meet the cut.

Though I can’t say much of what exactly it is I’m writing, (because it is a surprise) but I can tell u that writing these tracks have been twice as fun as writing the ones on the first album, which consequently means that it was twice as difficult. The key difference was that the first album was a personal,i.e cathartic one, while this one involves writing other people’s stories, which translates to ton loads of research. Having a mild case of self induced multiple personality disorder helps.

On average, 1 song has taken up to 2 weeks to research and conjure. The worst of the lot has taken 8 weeks because my brain implodes everytime I think about it. A songwriter traveling around with a concave head is not a good look whatever some might say. To top it off, there was an attempt on my end to build the musical styles around the characters/ stories I write about in the songs, which means some new musical territories for me. Whether I have pulled this off remains to be judged, by you, minions. There, the highness has become the all pleasing slave.

All this research and sometimes painful song wrangling also means that as the singles get released, I have heaps of stories to tell about them like a proud rabid parent with a screaming child. Not all is a pretty picture, then again it never is. That’s why you are here isn’t it?

So there it is, singles will be released starting febuary next year and u have an album in waiting. I have said this for a good part of last year and I’m glad the process is finally falling into gear.

On another note, the blog frequencies will be back to a near weekly basis from now, I’m a spider out of her cave.

Updates about the blog:

for those on myspace: start subscribing from www.yunyu.com.au or my livejournal

myspace has continued to taunt and torment me by not letting me log in when I need to and then crapping all over my formats whenever I try to post shit. So yes, this is a last post on I will sync on myspace blogs which is a real dog to use.

for updates through the week: I’m a twitter away

Just so you can still track me down

Yes quietude. But you can still track me down in the following locations

www.yunyu.com.au
livejournal
myspace
twitter

Quietude now…except for the chickens

No I haven’t gotten kidnapped by anyone made of initials, I haven’t become suddenly rich. I am still spinning here and though you might be able to choke some album details out of me by im-ing me I am sure as hell going to try and not spoil the surprise for you lot.

My biggest achievement of the months of silence is that I have perfected the art of quiet recording by following the schedule below.Ok other than the fact that I am also about 6 tracks into the album….sorta thing.

9.15am – chicken truck. parks with idling louder than harleys for 30 mins av ( no recording but can do midi stuff)
9.45am – chicken truck leaves
3am – rubbish truck belonging to chicken man parks in truck engines run for 20 min as they empty dead chooks
6.45am – rubbish truck here for florist – more truck noises

any other time makes for uninterrupted recording zones except weekends

10-ish. neighbour’s lawnmower butchering the garden and my recording time
11 – neighbours want to kill each other, usually it’s an argument about money. still waiting for them to kill each other so I can record some screams…so far no success

Friday nights –

kids and their doof doof cars – sometimes I borrow their beats to make new tracks. most times I envision making voodoo dolls of them and disconnecting their spinal cords with much relish.

at times I want to feed the voodoo dolls to my imaginary cat to play and eat.

yes yes yes, other than that my recording process is pretty noise free once I follow the above schedule.

No…other than that it’s slow news day. I’ve stumbled upon very interesting pieces of research for the sake of this album but then if I told you, the smart arses amongst you would piece it all together now and tell me what my album is going to be about and I will have to be doing the rather inconvenient thing of having to silence you.
which would be decidedly inconvenient for all of us. wouldn’t it?

Solving musical riddles

So far I’m writing about someone who takes very colourful pills and thinks her doctor is a funny bunny. I don’t know why she’s assumedly gone mad or why she’s talking about repression and everythign that rhymes.
and there’s this thing about red shoes being good things.

But I don’t know why. I don’t get a say in this I suspect. My pen is moving, I have no idea what I am writing and you thought I was a clever songwriter. Random words I tell u random words it is….! Muhahahahah

It’s a week to another gig this saturday and if you are in Sydney Australia, UNSW Roundhouse, 10 am. Which is a rare occurance in itself. For mornings for spidey are indeed mythical times…as some of you have so rightly put it.

Just me and the goat this time. Sofie’s still chasing musical gnomes somewhere in Europe.

Here you go …a peek in my cave. bigger pics are available at source.

Contorting realities

Writing.

did I say that for the last millionth time?
It’s a lull between shows at the moment so I thought I’d take the time to write while I can. Ideally I’d like a whole block of time clocked out for me but I can live with less. Fun with the camera while I cook up lyrics is a way to start. Writing is a distracted process for me. So far I’ve ended up dissecting a doll somewhere in the midst.

I did get some writing done

More here. It’s probably going to be more pics than words at this moment when everything that needs to be said by spidey needs to be sung. 🙂
later minions.

your royal madness.

Woah …thank u

First AMV found made with “Dance so Slowly”

Flattered truly I am :). And very well done

Your royal madness;
who is counting the hours to full restoration of her broadband quota.

Sniffles but back

*Comes out of the covers, looks left, then right…looks under the covers to double check, glances surreptiously at the demon of a flu virus that still lingers, and asks “Are we still doing this today, so many many pills…woah the colours…”*

It’s been awhile since a bout of flu has knocked me out for 2 whole weeks…well almost 2. I am guessing that my body has forgotten what flu is after what feels like an eternity of cease-fire from the beast. So *sniffles* where the hell were we?

Oh yes stories stories stories. Get these babies out of the way so we can have some new ones eh?

On catching up with old acquaintances
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Airport Catch ups
———————–

Last minute airport catch ups with 2 long time friends before I head back to Australia. Thanks for the send off dudes! One of them professes that I used to save her head from exploding in Chinese class from time to time….with gaffer tape. Gaffer tape helps. The other is someone whom I’ve known since I was 3, somehow, we went to the same music schools, the same kindergarden the same convent school. Which really translates to…we have so sooo much dirt on each other 😛

Always good to hear that old friends are traveling well and generally being happy beings. And of course, swapping stories of our various adventures was the highlight, wish there was more time, so I’d definitely have to spend more time catching up the next time I land in that area.

Some good some bad.
———————
Some catch ups good. Some catch ups bad. Some I want to lobotomize my head so I don’t feel and don’t remember. Especially those that dissolve into lifestyle comparisons about who’s got what and how much better we’re doing than them etc… It’s funny that as you age, your tolerance level for obligatory meet ups diminish past the point of zero. Toxic meet ups like that feel like bad seafood to me, you’re sick to the stomach and you wonder why you didn’t smell it coming.

Truly, I rather be hanging around with friends and discussing the important issues like…hmmm… what kind of brain has the most fiber for a healthy zombie diet.

Ok more stories coming…but we take a break because the force has been disturbed and I have been tagged by Sofie to answer the following. 5 reasons why I blog.

1) I am paranoid. I live in the constant fear of having my brains scrambled by a psychopath with chopsticks. In my dream, he jams the chopsticks up through my nose and I forget who I am and become a psycho killer servant of destruction with no memories. This journal might be the one that saves me…or is all that is left of me.

2) I don’t know, but something about the minions here addressing me as “Mistress” and other forms of godhood is good enough to keep me here and wanting more.

3) Because the other alternative is expensive therapy sessions.

4) There’s no one else to talk to here except me, the house and the voices in my head…

5) Because my cat said, “go forth and blog”…

Now I tag thee. Why the hell do you blog…5 reasons.

Now.

I said …Go.

popcorn 2

Second piece of popcorn. Nursing a cold at the moment. Woke up with it. Apparently, my body is just not giving me a break at the moment, might have caught the virus while packed in the Cinema watching Transformers.

Awesome mindless entertainment.

Gigs in Singapore
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Yeah I spoke about that before. But I didn’t actually tell u what happened in our second show in Singapore yeah? Let’s just say that there was a minor miscommunication between the organisers of the arts fest and the army and we ended up fighting for Sonic shout space with the Singapore Army who were rehearsing for their national day parade at the same time that we were performing.

I’m pretty sure the audience didn’t see/ hear much of it..or maybe they didn’t mind the remixes. But…when you are performing and your ears are like a bat’s you hear the army anthems good and it was disconcerting to hear happy, nationalistic anthems dwelling in some of my tunes.

I mean I don’t remember drums to the beat of swing in my songs and was it trumpets? and whooping cheering things…maniacal laughter yes but cheers of nationalistic joy are another tale to be told by another girl.

Then there were the army boats parked at the waterfront across where we were performing. I keep picturing a blitzkrieg of the stage via land, sea and air. Especially the sea.

I don’t think I do well with authority figure type things. Bah.

Ah well…it’s not everyday that u get to sing to a nation’s army…if they were listening.