So by now youre thinking, jesus will they ever just get on with it te fuck!
All in good time my friends, all in good time :)
So this story starts in February 2010. Actually, it started long before that, but began in earnest around then. When the day finally dawned on us as a working band, we had an absolute wealth of material, most of which we had been working on for the previous 18-24 months. During that time, we had played some of it live, and from the feedback we received, people were considering it our strongest to date.
About 6 months prior to this we had had made an attempt to record things ourselves, but through laziness and pure inexperience we just ended up letting it go, in the hope that we might soon make a trip to a studio. Alas, it wasn't to be, and when we called time on the band, we had a gap of nearly 5 years with regards to recorded material. An absolute shame, and I personally (Bob), felt it didnt reflect our evolution as a group. Gallows Hill is something that we were all proud of, but it was old and we had moved on leaps and bounds since we had sat down to process that. Indeed, we had welcomed a new member since then, and had no recorded evidence of it.
Anyways, when the band parted ways, It kinda allowed all of us to just sit back and take stock, to see what we wanted to do. Bryan G was testing the waters with a move to Scotland, Dan was hoping to do some travelling, and both Brian O and Conor we're participating in other projects. I was lucky enough to have moved into a nice house out the country (with very few neighbours :) ), so automatically had a room setup for some live work. I had always been interested in home recording, and picked up some nice standalone gear over the coming months. After getting semi-familiar with the whole thing, I floated the idea to the rest of the lads that I wanted to do a recording of a select few of our more recent songs. It was intended to be my first official studio project, and I couldn't think of a better subject than our own material.
So, in January of last year I went about setting up for the session. Over a period of 2 weeks or so, Brian O and myself put down some guide guitars and drums. Bryan G had set a date for his move to haggis country, so we were under a bit of pressure with regards his parts. On an absolutely baltic Saturday morning, we set out to Kildimo, to our longtime practise space and setup for some guitar work. Over that whole weekend, we managed to get some good material, and finally got a taste for how it was going to turn out. We waved good bye to Bryan, and put the project on hold for a while.
Fast forward to May, I had prepared the final drum tracks at GC studios (aka, the drum room at my house : )
so again, Brian O and myself took off for our practise space to finish out the guitar contributions. We shot through his parts in no time, and had a good base to start some vocals. A few weeks later, Dan came out to record , and by this stage, we were all getting pretty stoked by what was recorded already. Some rough mixes were sent out, and everybody was pleased with how things were progressing.
Again, a few months passed before we could get back into the driving seat, and as 2011 loomed closer, we pencilled in January for Conors bass tracks. Following two days of solid work, I returned home with some very strong material and an absolute thirst to close the project out. Further work with Brian O on backing vocals and some more stellar performances from Dan, and we were just about done.
That brings us to today, February 27th, and Im proud to say, I have 3 (what I believe are) very very fine songs in my possession, which I feel are a strong representation of what Roper was and what it was becoming before we called time on it. The bonus for me personally, is that its the first recording Ive engineered and recorded myself. 3 tracks isn't a whole pile when you talk about it, but the work required to get everything and everyone together often goes undocumented.
So anyways, thanks for reading !.., our three track EP will be available shortly (to be mixed by the very talented Owen Lewis), so keep checking our facebook page, and watch out for our updates.
We thank the few very loyal people who have kept their interest in us alive, and we're certain that you wont be disappointed when you hear the final result.
Cheers and Thanks,
Bobmeaney and Roper
