After The Sycamore Falls, I've had three more singles out this year, all of which have been played live as well.
Digital Twin came out in June; I'd always had it in mind as a song and Neet Neilson then wrote the lyrics and sang them. Can a computer program duplicate a person? Despite the ethics, the attempts to do so date right back to the early days of computing and the Simulmatics Corporation.
Here's me talking about it at Red Eye studios in Clydebank on the 9th of May 2025:
https://youtu.be/B26Ly4_EqyU?si=qP2tjIR9J8fy3bJj
It's a departure from my usual rhythm but, at the same time, more of a return to the heavy synth sound of Rain of Diamonds or Checkmate In Shadows - strangely enough, another early programming quest was getting computers to play chess at grandmaster level.
The video was also from Neet and it can be found here:
https://youtu.be/Ma4tKLwa0OM?si=btG6GHuoq9TrFE7r
Papermoney in September was that rare thing, one of my own lyrics, sung by me. Music-wise I wanted a synth sound that kept changing, so I set up something which would alter its tone with each new bar. This used to be the stuff of modular synths but the modulation on a lot of software synths can be set up for it.
I read The Ragged-Trousered Philanthropists a while ago; I didn't like it because the characters never felt real and were only there to express the author's own ideals. One thing did stick with me and it is how the socialists described the society they wanted; that it would be near moneyless. Coins would still exist for small transactions but wealth that could be accumulated was to be done away with.
John Lennon had that line about "Imagine No Possessions" and, given his wealth at the time, he barely got away with it. If he really wanted to mess with people's heads it should have been "Imagine No Money" but that would have gone down even worse. It's a good question though; all modern civilisations had this idea that our work and resources are translated into money, which then is translated into other items but has all the accompanying complications.
What if we decided to do away with it? It's a human invention after all, just as much as the wheel or the microchip.
So, going back to the book, I used the already old-fashioned term of "paper money". Our notes are now all plastic and cash isn't used as much as it used to be anyway - not a good move in my opinion, but that's a rant for another time. Should it be a paper tiger, something unreal that people are made to fear? The cost of living crisis has, unfortunately, made it clear that we need the stuff.
There are swipes at consumerism (the same reason as one of the instrumentals is called Last Year's Colour) but I'm never going to be as good at this stuff as "Funk Pop A Roll" by XTC (another group I love) so maybe I shouldn't try to compete. Again, people are now struggling to pay for the things they do need, never mind the stuff they don't, and I don't want to sound like a notorious MP telling us we can feed ourselves on 30p a day.
After hearing it, Neet's friend Donna talked to me about the work of Alan Watts, including his tale of many countries' gold reserves being lost in a natural disaster but carrying on regardless anyway. So, it's all as much an illusion as Bitcoin is.
No video, as I don't make them myself, but here it is on Bandcamp:
Papermoney | Nation Stole My Robots
And so the Christmas. I had the combination of a church organ and a motorik beat (how very me!) for a long while but when the tune eventually took shape I passed it to Neet in December 2024 and suggested it as a Christmas song! Clearly there would not have been time to put it out then but the opportunity was there to write the lyrics and then wait until a sunny day in August before recording them.
It’s not as though there’s loads of modern Christmas songs I like, although I do think “Stop the Cavalry” is genius, hence the original choice of title - All Over By Christmas. Then Ladytron claimed that one and if there ever was an act that made me do what I'm doing now, they're it. So, after talking about other titles and themes, Neet came up with A Place Of Love. All that, plus her video and our barely-rehearsed live performance at Charlie's Loft, was ready for the end of November.
