All in all, there are fifty two tracks (30 instrumentals and 22 songs) - the collection sonically upgrades some old favourites, includes a few previously unreleased items (like the new song "Vendôme") and, I hope, some undiscovered gems...
I've tried to steer clear of some of the more obvious choices for inclusion...
Physical copies will be available soon - in the meantime, please have a listen...
Disc One : Soundscapes
Disc Two : Songs
Aftersilence
"From pure sensation to the intuition of beauty, from pleasure and pain to love and the mystical ecstasy and death — all the things that are fundamental, all the things that, to the human spirit, are most profoundly significant, can only be experienced, not expressed. The rest is always and everywhere silence. After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music. When the inexpressible had to be expressed, Shakespeare laid down his pen and called for music. And if the music should also fail? Well, there was always silence to fall back on. For always, always and everywhere, the rest is silence."
Aldous Huxley "The Rest is Silence" from "Music at Night", 1931
Sleeve notes...
Soundscapes
29 V 96 – I (David Reilly/Stewart Robinson)
Original Source : 29.V.96 & 6.VI.96
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Keyboards, Samples; Stewart Robinson – Electric Double Bass
Recording Date : May 1996
Notes : The very first recording issued under the name of Cloudland Blue Quartet, or rather “The” Cloudland Blue Quartet. This is the opening edit of track one on the first of four annual collaborational albums of improvisations, made with old friend and fellow ex-Dancer of San Martino, Stewart Robinson, under his guise of Peri Urban. We created some samples, loaded up the Akai, plugged in his huge, home made, electric Upright Double Bass and just played whatever came into our heads...
Event One : The Way a Plane Crosses the Sky (David Reilly)
Original Source : Events One and Two
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Samples, Synthesiser, Guitar, Environments
Recording Date : June 1996
Notes : A new edit of the first solo CBQ recording, influenced by my work with Peri. Recorded in the back room at Reptile Records with a mic stuck out the window and all keyboards fired up and utilised in one way or another. I added guitar and treated everything into a miasma of blur...
Event Four : An American in Europe (David Reilly)
Original Source : Events Three and Four
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Samples, Synthesiser, Environments
Recording Date : July 1996
Notes : A visit from our old American chum, John Burch, now sadly gone, prompted this recording. He was keen to hear what I was up to music-wise so I recorded an hour or so of my favourite songs from my repertoire and added a long soundscape using the same methods as those for the first three “Events”. All live and completely improvised - the big noises were made by banging or blowing on a microphone with the longest and largest reverb setting available...
Overcast, Strange Day (David Reilly)
Original Source : Gold Leaf Deep Red
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Samples, Synthesiser, Environments
Recording Date : January 1997
Notes : “Gold Leaf Deep Red” was an instrumental album of which I was truly proud. I’d developed a Fripp-esque guitar sound by linking together several distortion boxes and a wah wah pedal – a sound I was now using with the band Crazy Wisdom. The album showcased a number of (probably in retrospect over-long) guitar solos, over improvisations created using a sampler with orchestral sounds and my trusty old Yamaha CS-5 synthesiser. The guitar isn’t featured on this track though, the “scene-setter” for the LP...
Over the Lake (David Reilly)
Original Source : Over the Blue and Gold
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Guitar, Synthesisers, Samples
Recording Date : February 1997
Notes : So here is the guitar sound for the first time. “Over the Blue and Gold” was a kind of remix album. I took each of the six pieces on “Gold Leaf Deep Red” and added more synthesisers and Motorik Neu!-like drum tracks. It made a fine companion piece to the original LP. The drums aren’t featured in this compilation though – they were just too damn loud for the overall mood. Instead, I’ve limited this edit to the finale of the piece. You can tell my guitar is just sooo influenced by Fripp’s performance on “The Heavenly Music Corporation”...
Bolivia April Three (David Reilly)
Original Source : Bolivia April Three
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Guitar, Keyboards
Recording Date : April 1997
Notes : The third track based on “Gold Leaf Deep Red”. In April 1997 the live debut of CBQ took place during a fund raiser for Crazy Wisdom mainman Malcolm Logan’s sister, Julie, who was going to Bolivia to work with street kids – hence the title. The set comprised songs from the still six months away from release triple CD “Callingstill” – but this was the overture – an improvised “sky-saw” guitar solo over the piece “The Light Coming In” which featured on both “Gold Leaf Deep Red” and the final Crazy Wisdom LP from the following year, “We Live the Foreigner’s Life”....
Sudden Charms (David Reilly)
Source : Frozen Architecture
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Samples, Keyboards
Recording Date : April 1997
Notes : “Frozen Architecture” was a forty five minute piece divided into four separate movements of which this edit comes from the third. Each was distinctly different, with its own separate instrumentation. This part is a string led soaring piece which made the transition into more subdued synthesiser tones just before the finale of the whole piece. One of my favourite CBQ soundscapes...
Jaffa Cake April Tutu (David Reilly)
Original Source : Jaffa Cake April Tutu
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Guitar, Environment
Recording Date : April 1997
Notes : A twenty second guitar solo (following some treated firework sounds) from the middle of the second live set of April 1997, actually the introduction to the “Callingstill” song, “Lucifer Falling”....
29 V 97 - I (David Reilly/Stewart Robinson)
Original Source : 29.VI.97 4.VI.97 12.VI.97
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Piano, Samples, Synthesisers; Stewart Robinson – Electric Double Bass
Recording Date : May 1997
Notes : I re-convened with Peri Urban on the anniversary of our first recordings and we used the same set up as before to record a second album, this time over three dates. Once again, I’ve chosen the opening edit from the first track on the album. I especially love Peri’s bowed bass playing and the piano and, of course, the Eno-esque sweeping synthesiser...
The Calm before the Storm (David Reilly)
Original Source : Callingstill
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Keyboards, Guitars, Synthesisers
Recording Date : February – November 1997
Notes : The only unedited piece on this first disc, this comes from towards the end of the third CD of the “Callingstill” trilogy - just prior to the raucous rocker “Holier Than Thou” - and its mood reflects its title. I especially like the little guitar motif which permeates the track....
Day after Day of Murder (David Reilly)
Original Source : April to Wait a Tick
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Piano, Synthesiser
Recording Date : April 1998
Notes : “Day After Day of Murder” was the shorter of two improvised instrumental pieces added in the studio to the recording of what was to be the last CBQ live set for almost five years – although I didn’t know that at the time. The other, unfeatured, track was “A Day Sitting in a Chair”. I can’t recall the origin of these titles now. This edit fits in nicely with the mood of the surrounding tracks – although you can tell I’m no Chopin....
18 VIII 98 - II (David Reilly/Stewart Robinson)
Original Source : VII.98 VIII.98 X.98 XI.98
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Samples; Keyboards; Stewart Robinson - Guitar
Recording Date : August 1998
Notes : The third date with Peri Urban and, this time, he introduced some rhythm tracks to the proceedings to try and spice things up a bit. I wasn’t too keen on this development though, having enjoyed the first two albums so much. Accordingly, this edit, although it’s from a piece which featured percussion, is taken from the rhythm-less closing section. It features some distant guitar soloing from Mr Urban, over an ominous drone from yours truly...
Early (David Reilly)
Source : Semi-Automatic
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Synthesisers
Recording Date : November 1998
Notes : “Semi-Automatic” was one 80 minute improvisation, recorded in one take in late 1998 using the newly acquired looping technology which I’d coveted for some considerable time – since 1974 probably, three years before I started musicking. This is from the opening piece of the album which, later, featured some sample and guitar work too. This edit is restricted to synthesisers though. The album set the tone for the next period of instrumental CBQ work...
Beethoven (David Reilly)
Original Source : Betonmusik (Previously Unreleased Version)
Instrumentation : David Reilly - Samples
Recording Date : March 1999
Notes : A previously unreleased version of the third track from the next CBQ album “Betonmusik”, which comprised just three albeit very long pieces. An edit of the first is next in this collection, while the second was true “Betonmusik” or “Musique Concrete”, foregoing actual music for 20 minutes of looped sound effects. This piece (the original take which broke down too early) again features no actual playing by me – just some judicious looping of a couple of short extracts from one of Beethoven’s late string quartets, Opus 132 – a piece to which I’ve returned several times over the years, most recently on “We Drove” from 2009’s “Soundingfall”...
April 4, 1955 (David Reilly)
Original Source : Betonmusik
Instrumentation : David Reilly - Synthesisers, Samples
Recording Date : April 1999
Notes : An edit from around the middle of this twenty minute piece entitled for the date of my parent’s wedding – from which all CBQ music stems I suppose. Once again using the recently acquired looping technology, this track combined slowly changing synth motifs with, towards the end, some Concrete Music as per the title of the album, featuring some apt Wedding Bells....
Reinhardt (David Reilly)
Original Source : Reinhardt Richter Rosenquist
Instrumentation : David Reilly - Guitar
Recording Date : June 1999
Notes : “Reinhardt Richter Rosenquist” was another loop based album with three pieces. Titled for three exponents of Modern Art, this edit comes from the “Reinhardt” piece, probably the most aggressive of the three (“Richter” included some input from Peri Urban and colleague Alan Martin, a reworking of which formed the basis for the title track of the LP “Ampersand” three years later). I do still enjoy listening to “Reinhardt” in full, and how each guitar line slowly recedes into the background to be replaced by the next generation....
Rolf's Party (David Reilly/Stewart Robinson)
Original Source : 6.II.99 & 6.XI.99
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Keyboards, Samples ; Stewart Robinson – Guitar, Electric Double Bass
Recording Date : February 1999
Notes : The last of the four collaborations with Peri Urban comprised, for the first time, tracks with actual titles rather than dates and numbers. It wasn’t recorded as an album but put together in hindsight once we realised we weren’t going to do any more and it was, to all intents and purpose, “finished”. I especially like this track as it’s in the original spirit of what we set out to do. I think some of my most satisfying instrumental work was produced with Peri, with whom I’ve continued to work on and off over the years, most recently on the live version of “Soundingfall” and by utilising some of his sounds on the last CBQ album “Splinterheart”...
April 1, 2000 (David Reilly)
Original Source : 20/20 Vision 1977-2000
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Environment, Treatment
Recording Date : April 2000
Notes : Just a microphone out of the window and some treatment of the resulting sounds. I recorded this to finish off “20/20 Vision” a two disc compilation from 2000 of Songs and Soundscapes – a precursor to this very collection. Nothing much happens but there’s nothing wrong with that in my book....
Surface Insolation (David Reilly)
Original Source : Previously Unreleased
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Synthesiser; Craig Sutherland – Programming, Synthesiser
Recording Date : 2000
Notes : An edit of a longer electronic piece recorded with Craig Sutherland of Creek. There’s actually an entire album of this stuff which remains unreleased called “Clear Sky days”. One track, “Solar Radiation” was included on “Ampersand” two years later. The rest are yet to see the light of day. We weren’t really sure if this was CBQ stuff or Creek stuff - I enjoyed this piece again when compiling this instrumental disc and thought it would be good to include it...
Ampersand (David Reilly/Stewart Robinson/Alan Martin)
Original Source : Ampersand (Previously Unreleased Version)
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Samples; Alan Martin – Keyboards; Stewart Robinson - Guitar
Recording Date : February 2001 – February 2002
Notes : An edit from the complete, longer version of the title track from 2002’s “Ampersand” which marked the end of three years of dithering and unfocussed work with a good number of people. Similar in vein to the pieces previously recorded with Peri Urban, again this has an Eno-esque feel to it which I really enjoy. Of course it features some backwardness, also something I enjoy...
Cloudland Blue (David Reilly)
Original Source : File Under Electronica
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Keyboards, Rhythm Bed
Recording Date : April 1993, April 2003
Notes : In 2003, having returned to live performance, I took a break from song writing for what would become the “Anotherhappyday” album and worked on some remixes of various “ambient” pieces produced over the previous ten years. When I say “remixes”, I mean adding rhythm tracks from a newly acquired drum machine in one take over unaltered slowly evolving pieces – I particularly liked the results of the rhythm improvs on this piece, the source having originally been recorded back in 1993 and which went on to be the name of the “band”...
Sonnenschein (David Reilly)
Original Source : One More Chance EP
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Guitar, Rhythm Bed
Recording Date : May 2003
Notes : Another piece with a rhythm track, this time combining the drum machine with guitar loops. Named for my German chum Jorg Sonnenschein, it turned up as a “B” side on a CD single in the middle of 2003 – I think I included it there just to show people buying the singles that short “pop” songs weren’t all that CBQ did and maybe to stretch things a little. This was the blueprint for the work carried out slightly later on the title track from “Anotherhappyday”...
On the Sands (David Reilly)
Original Source : SANDS EP
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Guitars, Synthesisers, Rhythm Bed, Samples
Recording Date : November 2003
Notes : In hindsight this piece is kind off ill-fitting on the disc, since it actually has a discernable “tune”. Recorded for a charity fund-raising EP which featured a re-write/re-recording of the song “I Re-Arranged the House” and the especially written “Keep Living”, I suppose this might be described by some as “filler” – I thought it would be nice to give it a second life here...
Getting (David Reilly)
Original Source : 04 04 04
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Synthesiser, Environment
Recording Date : April 2004
Notes : The album “04 04 04” was a return to the simple “set up and play” recording technique of “Semi-Automatic”. The trusty “mic out the window” was also used while loops in each of the keys A, B, C, D, E, F, and G were created on the old Yamaha CS 5. “Getting” is, as you might expect, the piece in G. A very quiet album where not much happens really – but I like it....
Crashed (David Reilly)
Original Source : Souvenir VII : Recorded Live
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Guitar, Synthesiser, Environment; Alan Brodie - Synthesiser
Recording Date : June 2004
Notes : “Crashed” was the piece in C from “04 04 04”. This live recording however is more looped guitar based. Taken from one of two full band performances in the summer of 2004, this was the introductory piece. Some judicious white noise added by long time cohort Mr Brodie, aka Count Brodski...
A Tendency to Persist (David Reilly)
Original Source : The Deeperdown EPs
Instrumentation : David Reilly - Guitar
Recording Date : August 2004
Notes : Also stemming from live shows in 2004, the “Fifty Five Songs” series which comprised song-based performances over five weeks featuring, as you might have surmised, fifty five different songs from the CBQ and Sombre Reptiles back catalogue. Each night began with a soundscape and “A Tendency to Persist” was the 17 minute piece which survived from the recordings. The edit featured here is a little frantic and tuneless to begin with before settling into the usual routine - but it offsets some of the other material on this disc quite nicely I think....
In the Morning (David Reilly)
Original Source : Through the Day
Instrumentation : David Reilly - Guitar
Recording Date : August 2005
Notes : In 2005 a machine was acquired which allowed even longer looping than before. To date though, only one LP has been recorded with it. This track sets the tone for the majority of the album, again, one which I still enjoy listening to today. I like the use of harmonics which also featured later in the album, albeit reversed...
Sospiri I (David Reilly)
Original Source : Sospiri
Instrumentation : David Reilly - Samples
Recording Date : December 2005
Notes : This may well count as another Musique Concrete album given that there is no actual playing by me included. Rather, the tracks were created by putting together short edits of phrases from Edward Elgar’s “Sospiri”, plus various sound effects and the judicious use of sample drum motifs in order to create three brand new “Sospiri”’s. Again, one of my favourite instrumental CBQ albums and, in fact, six years down the line, it remains the latest in the series...
Nimrod (David Reilly)
Original Source : Previously Unreleased
Instrumentation : David Reilly - Samples
Recording Date : December 2006
Notes : A year on from “Sospiri” I was working on the song based “Ersatzreal” but became sidetracked while trying to use Elgar’s “Nimrod” in some way. I ended up with a 40 minute or so track split into three parts on the unreleased album “Concrete”. It features the ultra slowed down “Nimrod” of the title, superimposed with treated-out-of-all-recognition tracks by Madonna and The Beatles – so much so that, while I can recall the Madonna track used was “Hollywood”, I can no longer make out which Beatles song was stretched and twisted. Nice to give it its first airing here though...
The Eternal Optimist (David Reilly/Stewart Robinson/Norman Lamont)
Original Source : Splinterheart Extras
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Treatments; Stewart Robinson – Samples; Norman Lamont – Guitar, Samples
Recording Date : November 2009 – May 2010
Notes : An edit from a track from the “Extras” disc from “Spinterheart”. The full version of this is 30 minutes long and, once again, I played no instruments – the piece comprises sourced sounds from Peri Urban and Norman Lamont along with various other samples. The edit featured is, aptly, the closing section, fifteen years on from the first work with Mr Urban...
Songs
Attention to Detail (David Reilly)
Original Source : Callingstill
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Vocals, Guitars, Keyboards, Programming
Recording Date : February to November 1997
Notes : A nice little ambient opening before heading into the loping groove of this “sky-saw” guitar led piece, the second on the debut CBQ song set, the triple album “Callingstill”. The lyric concerns expectation, the dashing of same and the inability to be released from some kind of contract? I don’t know....
Favourite Line : “I never said I’d change your life so stop looking at your watch. All I said was I’d give you cash for every idea you’ve ever had”
Sundaydream (David Reilly)
Original Source : Callingstill
Instrumentation : David Reilly - Vocals, Guitars, Keyboards, Programming
Recording Date : February to November 1997
Notes : Organ and guitars in one ear and a clumsily created string quartet in the other – plus thundering drums. Like so many of my lyrics I have little idea of what it’s about although I think this hints at some disturbing, buried memory of the protagonist....
Favourite Line : “The sky above is deep, deep blue, the grass below has a verdant hue”
Sky Blue Sky (David Reilly/Alan Brodie)
Original Source : Doveloveshawk
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Vocals, Synthesisers; Alan Brodie – Synthesisers; Malcolm Logan - Synthesisers
Recording Date : July 1997 – December 1999
Notes : The original backing track for this piece from “Doveloveshawk” was recorded during one of the final Crazy Wisdom sessions. I added further string-synths and the vocal to the rhythmic orchestral stabs. I like the juxtaposition of underlying menace in the delivery against the innocuousness of the lyric itself...
Favourite Line : “There’s a sky blue sky coming over the horizon and the birds are singing in the trees”
Overload (David Reilly/Andrew Wilson)
Original Source : Doveloveshawk (Previously Unreleased Version)
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Vocals, Guitars, Keyboards, Programming; Andrew Wilson – Synthesiser; Alastair Wilson - Vocals
Recording Date : July 1997 – December 1999
Notes : This newly created version of “Overload” melds together the very original version, recorded on the day the song was written, with the final version from “Doveloveshawk”. The parts from the latter have the ongoing piano motif while the former features my then nine-year old nephew, Alastair, on backing vocals, his then 13 year old brother, Andrew having co-written and played on the piece...
Favourite Line : “Watch the traffic cross the road, don’t look back it’s overload”
Twenty Twenty Vision (David Reilly)
Original Source : Ampersand
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Vocals; Stewart Robinson – Guitars, Bass, Programming, Vocals
Recording Date : April – December 2000
Notes : One of my all time favourite CBQ songs. Two versions appeared on “Ampersand” and it’s usually the second one that is played. This first was created from scratch by Peri Urban using only the vocal line from a recording to click track I did in his studio. The lyric concerns a mother or a partner who’s gone off the rails through no fault of her own (although drinking is also involved)...
Favourite Line : “Never mind television, she can’t even afford a radio”
Take Me to the Party (David Reilly)
Original Source : Ampersand
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Vocals, Guitars, Synthesisers
Recording Date : February – November 1999, January – June 2002
Notes : “Ampersand” was a strange album. It wasn’t recorded as an album, rather it gathered together pieces I’d worked on alone or in collaboration (hence the “&” of the title) over the three years until its release. This short track was created from an acoustic guitar piece recorded during the sessions for “Doveloveshawk”. I added a throwaway lyric, a kind of blues pastiche and some off the wall synthesiser. It’s growing on me...
Favourite Line : “Take me to the party, leave me lying on the floor”
Hollow Man (Stewart Robinson/David Reilly/Robert Gillies/Alan Brodie)
Original Source : Ampersand
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Vocals, Guitars; Stewart Robinson – Bass, Programming; Robert Gillies – Guitars; Alan Brodie - Synthesisers
Recording Date : March 1985, January – June 2002
Notes : “Ampersand also featured re-recordings of older pieces. I kind of re-did a Sombre Reptiles song “Berlin” and my first ever recording from 1977 “First Declension”. I say “kind of” as all I did was take the original track and then play more stuff over the top. This song comes from the debut album by Dancers of San Martino – so I am dueting here with my seventeen year younger self whist adding acoustic guitars to the fray. Lyrics by Peri Urban and I love Bob’s guitar solo....
Favourite Line : “It hurts when I walk, my shoes mimic a mouth set to talk”
The Sun Goes Down Too Soon (David Reilly)
Original Source : Anotherhappyday
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Vocals, Guitars, Keyboards, Synthesisers, Programming
Recording Date : August 2003
Notes : The last song recorded for “Anotherhappyday”. The original lyric was written to describe what happened the day my dad died and I rushed to my parents’ house only to arrive too late. They were a little too raw and, on the suggestion of the Exec Producer, I rewrote them, working in references to incidents in our own time together...
Favourite Lines : “Listening to Michael Rother in a strange house in the snow” / “I spend my time working on music that no-one ever hears”
Perfectly Simple (David Reilly)
Original Source : Anotherhappyday
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Vocals, Guitars, Keyboards, Synthesisers, Programming
Recording Date : April 2003
Notes : A circulating chord sequence backs up a lyric based, like a number of CBQ songs, on a short story by Ernest Hemmingway. The story in question is “Hills Like White Elephants” about a decision to be made by a young couple. I didn’t manage to work in a reference to the elephants though. My favourite part of this song is the guitar solo. I can’t believe it’s actually me playing it...
Favourite Line : “Would you do something for me right now? Would you please, please, please stop talking?”
The Crocodile Song (David Reilly/Andrew Wilson)
Original Source : Deeperdown
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Vocals, Guitars, Keyboards, Programming
Recording Date : February 2003 – October 2005
Notes : Another perennial CBQ favourite – which I think people like for its rather happy-go-lucky tune – co-written with my nephew, Andy. I’m not sure if people get the sinister lyric though. Like the previous track, this is based on someone else’s writing, in this case Francois Mauriac’s “The Viper’s Knot” - although it’s not a literal re-write like “Perfectly Simple” – I merely took one line “Crocodile I am and Crocodile I’ll stay” and wrote the lyric around that. Andy came to me with the music of the verses and I added the lyrics and the soaring chorus...
Favourite Line : “I know you want to be with me, even if it seems like something else to you”
Still We Doubt You (David Reilly)
Original Source : Deeperdown
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Vocals, Guitars, SFX
Recording Date : February 2003 – October 2005
Notes : One of very few “political” lyrics in the CBQ canon, this is a song about invasion, written from the perspective of the invaders – or rather the people carrying out, rather than ordering, the invasion. It also take a swipe at armchair critics who are not on the front line facing danger. The song was written at the time of the invasion of Iraq, in a defiant mood regarding the hippy dippy claptrap being bandied around by many of my fellow songwriters. They didn’t get it though...
Favourite Line : “The instruments shine in your eyes, for all I know they blind you to the plight of those beneath your wheels. There’s nobody quite like you.“
Very Small (David Reilly)
Original Source : Deeperdown
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Vocals; Andrew Wilson - Piano
Recording Date : March 2004 – October 2005
Notes : Probably my favourite song from “Deeperdown”, this version features my nephew on “hesitant” piano – I think the recording I used may well have been his first run through. I particularly like the close harmonies of the backing vocals. A song about overprotection...
Favourite Line : “Now you’re kept away from everyone and you’re out of sight of everything and you don’t know anything about anything at all“
Starting to Worry (David Reilly)
Original Source : Ersatzreal
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Vocals, Guitars, Synthesisers, Programming
Recording Date : March 2006 – July 2007
Notes : Another favourite for me. I always enjoy singing the lyrics I don’t really understand – even though I wrote them. I used to think this was about someone who had committed some terrible crime being kept in a secure facility, drugged and hallucinating about the past. Listening to it recently though, I had the thought that it might be about someone suffering from Alzheimer’s. Whatever it is, I really like the song and the way all the backing kind of sneaks in without you noticing...
Favourite Line : “I lost you many years ago and I’m sitting on my bed, the machines are everywhere I look now and they’re monitoring my brain, trying to see if I’m insane, the wires are everywhere I look now“
He Thinks of You (David Reilly)
Original Source : Ersatzreal
Instrumentation : David Reilly – Vocals, Guitars, Synthesisers, Programming
Recording Date : March 2006 – July 2007
Notes : One of the Exec Producer’s favourite CBQ songs. A lilting waltz written about the imaginary life of an audient I saw at a performance during the Edinburgh Festival in 2006. I tried to imagine what was behind the enigmatic smile she gave as she left mid-set. In reality, she probably just didn’t like my music very much...
Favourite Line : “And so you leave with just a smile and head for home. Behind the door you sit and cry”
Lights Out (David Reilly)
Original Source : Erstazreal (Previously Unreleased Version)
Instrumentation : David Reilly - Vocals, Guitars, Synthesisers, Programming
Recording Date : March 2006 – July 2007
Notes : Along with “The Angels’ Kiss” this was one of the two last songs to be written for the “Ersatzreal” album and, like “The Angels’ Kiss” it remains one of my CBQ favourites. As in many CBQ songs, there’s a pervading sense of loss, given that it seems to be about growing old and gradually losing all your friends. This version features a different vocal take from the original – the latter having been recorded line by line as I actually wrote the song....
Favourite Line : “And once they were so bright, they lit up my whole life. Now thy blink out one by one”
They Broke the Door Down (David Reilly)
Original Source : Soundingfall
Instrumentation : David Reilly - Vocals, Guitars, Percussion
Recording Date : March – April 2009
Notes : A recurring theme in my lyrics is about people being wrongly judged due to others jumping to conclusions and this is one of those. It became a favourite of mine only after I’d been rehearsing it with Peri Urban to present the “Soundingfall” album in a live acoustic setting. I like the fading up timpani and the treated, vocalised percussion...
Favourite Line : “They took him down with such heavy handed force that his blood was all over the place“
Please Stay With Us (David Reilly)
Original Source : Soundingfall
Instrumentation : David Reilly - Vocals, Guitars, Bass
Recording Date : November 2008 – April 2009
Notes : The first lyric written for the “Soundingfall” album was penned around three years before I finalised the song and recorded it. Once again there’s a sense of not quite knowing what’s going on here. And, of course, I enjoy that ambiguity. Another song in waltz time, with stops and starts. Much more energetic when played live, I think I enjoy this original, slower, version better...
Favourite Line : “And here is your bedroom, your bed is so soft and warm and clean but it’s not exactly new, if you’re worried, I can wash the linen again“
Blend (David Reilly)
Original Source : Soundingfall
Instrumentation : David Reilly - Vocals, Guitars, Bass, Percussion
Recording Date : September 2008 – April 2009
Notes : Along with “We Drove”, this is probably my favourite song on “Soundingfall” and, indeed, one of my all time favourite CBQ songs. I’d been working on the music and the strange way of playing the opening two chords for around a year before finalising the song. The majority of the lyric, other than the opening and closing verses, was written in Canada in 2008, based on a piece by Alistair Cooke in his “Letters from America” series, which I was reading at the time...
Favourite Line : “I walked through the silence and the colour and the heat and in the twilight saw his fingers play the barrel of his gun“
Splinterheart (David Reilly)
Original Source : Splinterheart
Instrumentation : David Reilly - Vocals, Guitars, Bass, Samples
Recording Date : April – June 2010
Notes : Written almost more quickly than it takes to play, this is the opening song from the last CBQ album, “Splinterheart” and seems to be the most popular song on it. A simple little love song originally in the first person but later switched to the third. I think I may have used a rhyming dictionary for this. I like the doo-wop backing vocals and the stop at the end of the first chorus...
Favourite Line : “So now his heart begins to splinter, he doesn’t think she’ll ever know”
Never or Now (David Reilly)
Original Source : Splinterheart
Instrumentation : David Reilly - Vocals, Guitars, Keyboards, Bass, Programming
Recording Date : September 2009 – June 2010
Notes : This song was written between the “Soundingfall” and “Splinterheart projects and was included in the live set supporting “Soundingfall”. For “Splinterheart” I added keyboards, bass and drums to the original acoustic version and it turned into a bit of an epic. One of the more “conventional” songs on that album, I really enjoy the progression from verse to chorus and, of course, the not so secret Beatles reference...
Favourite Line : “Never or now is what you said, we should be living but we’re almost dead and now you know life’s too short for waiting“
The Apple of Your Eye (David Reilly)
Original Source : Splinterheart
Instrumentation : David Reilly - Vocals, Synthesisers, Samples, Treatments, SFX
Recording Date : May – June 2010
Notes : Based around the opening of a piece from J S Bach’s “Goldberg Variations” and heavily laced with sound effects and synthesiser, this a song of regret – of finding out too late what someone really thought and consequently, realising you had always been unaware of the real situation. Of course part one wasn’t quite so tuneful, based as it was on a piece by Ginestera rather than Bach...
Favourite Line : “And now, after all these years I know, but it’s too late for me, for you”
Vendôme (David Reilly/Ryan Williamson)
Original Source : Previously Unreleased
Instrumentation : David Reilly - Vocals, Guitars, Samples; Ryan Williamson – Guitars, Keyboards, Bass, Vocoder, Drum Loop
Recording Date : 2001, 2007, November 2010
Notes : Having used samples of recordings by Brisbane’s “Sour Grapes Productions” on “Black Earth and the City Falls” from “Splinterheart”, I’d kept in touch with their Ryan Williamson. He posted an old instrumental piece of his on his blog. I loved the beautiful chord sequence he was using as soon as I heard it and felt I had to make this into a CBQ song (with his permission of course). For lyrics, I read up on the French town in question and just cut up phrases taken from descriptions of it. I doubled the length of Ryan’s track, added lead and backing vocals, acoustic guitars and some sampled birdsong and the piece was finished. The last CBQ song.
Favourite Line : “A tear shed by Jesus at the tomb of Lazarus”
Compiled and Remastered
April, May 2011
Produced by David Reilly
For Crispycat Recordings
Executive Producer : Anne Reilly
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