Here are my original A Minute’s Peace compositions from Day #71 onwards. A compilation of these pieces will be available to stream or download soon.
Rejected A 25-year-old piece, and one of the earliest tracks by me and Dave Chaney. Originally an ambient piece with pads and a Rhodes keyboard, we’ve a-minute’s-peacified it here.
You can listen to the original here: https://warheadsmusic.bandcamp.com/track/rejected
Dig In Sometimes, as a way of hunting for a melody, I spontaneously come out with words as I'm playing around with chords. In this case, it began "I quite liked the movie Digger today, though the critics said that it was s***".
I did rather like the movie.
All Fingers And Thumbs This one took about 40 takes – not because it’s massively complicated to play, but because the little finger of my left hand kept locking up, usually just as I was coming to the final bars.
40 takes and several muffled screams later, here it is…
Time Loop This one was improvised the morning after watching a mind-bending film called The Endless. Notice I wore the T-shirt to match.
A Leaf As autumn takes hold, a bitter wind sweeps through the valley and uncouples a leaf from its owner. Resigned, it flutters to the ground, but as it hits the earth it resolves to go out in a blaze of glory, gliding upwards again and glowing yellow, orange, red and bronze as it skitters and swirls past bus stops and chimney tops, blocks of flats, scarves and bobble hats.
An Aphantasia Fantasia I played this one with my eyes closed. It seemed appropriate. I’m an aphantasiac, which means I’m unable to voluntarily visualise mental images; in other words, I don’t have a mind’s eye, or at least not beyond the occasional fleeting, grainy, black and white image that disappears as soon as it arrives. I decided to write something that might spark some imagery in those who can visualise.
Boelo I woke up to the roar of the ocean – actually the continuous deep howl of the wind surging through the valley, bringing with it bursts of heavy rain. I’m pleased I stocked up on baked beans and Twiglets. Anyway, I wrote something to represent the storm gathering strength before giving way to total calm. I also wanted this to have a rigid, almost mechanical feel to it, because that’s how the storm felt this morning. I might have given myself RSI as a result, but that’s the lengths we go to here at A Minute’s Peace.