The corpse of Dear Laika is being re-animated once more, jolted from its three-month torpor, just in time to head into the studio tomorrow.
After having dangerous amounts of fun at the Horse Hospital, I retreated from the project again, scared about the condition of my voice. Due to a combination of poor technique, lack of practice, and caution thrown windward, each rehearsal and gig unfailingly buggered my voice up. I've still got a persistent muscular problem in my jaw and neck after a visit to an ENT and a masseuse, but no actual damage to my larynx, thank goodness. Being a singer sucks! This all bummed me out quite considerably, and I lost my motivation to continue working on the new album, as well as my faith in being able to continue performing live, let alone go on tour again.
I don't think I'm alone in tying my voice closely to selfhood. When my voice feels insufficient, I can't help but feel insufficient myself. But all this anxiety has also made me reflect bemusedly on how my speaking and singing voice has shifted over the past decade. This time ten years ago, I was singing classical baritone with immaculate vocal health, but I had also intimated to my girlfriend at the time that something was afoot with my gender. The process of transitioning for me meant literal physical changes to my vocal cords through habit, to the point where I can't access the lower baritone register except if I'm terribly sick; my partner affectionately refers to that husky octave-dropped voice as "Cool Izzy". My accent's also shifted a wee bit transatlantically, which gets me geographical questions from strangers and occasional comments from my parents.
When it comes to singing, my original primary aspirational reference point of Vashti Bunyan has been superceded by a self-admitted man of all people in Zac Pennington. Yes! — a trans woman who aspires to sing like a man, albeit a man who used to regularly perform in a dress and wears makeup far more often than I do. Could be a rather suspect state of affairs to anyone approaching gender in bad faith... My strange autistic fascination for Zac's androgynous public persona has even ended up infecting my lyricism and physical affectation. It's quite embarrassing really, or it could be if I let it be, especially since we've now met and played a show together. But I'm just working within the venerable tradition of popular-music mimesis. Whose voice(s) are we even singing with? It's all part of the silly little Promethean task of carving ourselves out of the stone given to us. That's what I tell myself anyway.
Anyway, I'm heading into the studio to record drums with the wonderful Dave Adsett, and maybe even some keyboards I wouldn't otherwise have access to at home. In the absense of internal motivation, continuing with the album is a matter of self-respect, yes, but moreso respect for all the friends who've helped and encouraged me over the years. It's incredible to be reminded that people I care about believe in the songs, even when I find it hard to believe in them myself. I haven't really been inspired by much new music. I'm rather cynically, spatially, socially detached from the whole thing. I don't have an end-of-year best-of list. I haven't gone to my friends' shows. I'm neither tapped in nor locked in. No wonder the prospect of another solo album feels like a perverse vanity sometimes.
One thing that's become apparent to me though is that I crave working creatively with other people and I crave immediacy. Much of my creative energy has gone into RPGs, a form that ticks both of those boxes so fulfillingly. What's more, I impulsively started LARPing in October! Not in the foam swords, yelling "Magic Missile!" in a field kind of way; the nattering in a hired hall with people pretending to be vampires kind of way. It's a delight to be able to stay intensely in-character for 4 hours, more or less non-stop, moving through a physical space. It's my shit — the theatre kid in me let loose, uninhibited! It's such an exciting form of storytelling, because instead of a single narrative experienced by all participants (as in "tabletop" RPGs), every player has their own story that weaves into the others, ripples of cause and effect often going unseen when you can only talk to a few people at a time. It thrives on a player-base that takes the initiative and generates stories for itself, and I love that. I'll refrain from talking at length about it now... Maybe there'll be another blog post dedicated to my ongoing RP involvements...
The upshot of this is that I love performing and creating in the moment. Working alone to fashion a static object that others can appreciate at a distance feels rather thankless in comparison. Hopefully, getting in the studio will be the buoyant musical experience I need right now.
What else? My sweetie dog Dora gave birth to eight healthy puppies two weeks ago. They're all squeaking like guinea pigs and their eyes should open any day now. They'll all go to good homes. I'm still waiting to hear if I'll have a new batch of schoolkids to teach in the new year...
Personal life aside, WOW, the album's getting recorded. It's happening. Nine songs on the docket — two without lyrics yet — and then I'll need to squeeze the last one out somehow... I hope they can eventually be shared in recorded form, not just in the beautiful transience of the Gig. Enough people I know have given effusive praise to the songs that I can say with some degree of confidence that it will be worth it in the end.
In the meantime, I did an interview with Cantilever if you want to know more about the songs and other things that interest me, and I also recorded a Patty Waters cover if you'd like to listen to that as well. That's all for now...