So what do you do when you finally finish the process of making an album, when it's out in the world, you sit back and say “ok, this really is finished”? You start making another one I suppose, right? 

I had my interview with Mick. It was fun. I will put it out on my podcast, Whatever Comes Next. I was thinking that I might turn the episode into something more conceptual — maybe I'll add some music, or spoken word, some collages. I don't know what exactly, but it could be interesting. 

If Sara has any of the videos ready by the time I want to release the episode, it would make sense to have them there too. 

And now onto the next endeavour. 

The next album will be collaboration number two with Existent / Nonexistent. We've agreed we're going to do it. In the past days and weeks I've been warming my brain up to doing creative writing again. In parallel I've been making a conscious effort to escape from my phone. It's a scourge and a drain of ideas and inspiration. 

Tentatively, I think I can say I'm starting to feel some positive result as I live a little bit more in the world around me and not this insidious little void. No offence Ms Mobile Phone. 

So partly to push myself into action I messaged E/Ne yesterday to say I'd have some material ready to send them by the end of the year. 

I'm not going to fuss myself with trying to plan the whole thing out conceptually track by track (as I previously had planned). I'm going to take it one track at a time and see how it evolves. 

I have a couple of actual “songs”, but now I'm not sure if I want them to be part of this project, or save them. No, actually I remember now, I've decided I will include them. Why? They're connected to the past, so I want to have everything that ties to my time in Germany and Czechia completed — if for nothing more than the psychological peace of being able to draw a line and say my life is moving on. 

So with all that being the case the album will be Devil Girl and Her Latin Mushrooms. That'll be one of the songs. And what else? TBD. 

And then just like that the album was released out into the world. 

With the help of Sara (well she did most of the work) I had a few teaser clips for the album and I posted them on Instagram. Not exactly the most comprehensive of marketing programmes for the album, but I have a few more promotional ideas for the coming weeks. 

So anyway, Real Silence came out on Drama Recorder on the 11th of October. If you're somehow choosing to read this, but you haven't given it a listen yet, check it out. It's sitting quietly on bandcamp, waiting for you. Yes you, just you. 

I'm happy that the album is out there and I'm happy with how it turned out. Another document of a point in my life. That's how I take all my albums anyway — a partially abstracted oral journal. When I listen to these tracks I can remember where the texts were all written. The album was all made during my year living in Berlin. Some of the words came together in Berlin, a chunk during a two-week holiday in Crete spent baking and sweating in the sun. One of them ("Over The Sides") references some journal writing I did while I was living in Prague, but that text was also written in Crete.

Most of the mixing was done in London after I'd come back to the UK at the end of last year, but when I listen to the album I can say that it is a document of my life in Berlin in 2023. For Augurio Drama it would surely be something else. I don't know how far back some of their instrumental pieces go, but for me, that's what this album represents. 

Going back to promoting the album, I was surprised and delighted that my close friend Mick said he liked the album a lot. He suggested interviewing me about it, which I think is a fun idea. I suggested that we can post the interview on my podcast Whatever Comes Next. Me being interviewed on my podcast about my album. A little self-indulgent perhaps, but it's my podcast after all. I can do as I please and it should be fun to have something a bit unusual to get released around Christmas/ New Year. So that's the plan. Hopefully we'll record the interview this weekend. I have no idea what any of his questions will be.

Following that, I've commissioned Sara to make three music videos for the album. I have no firm date for those, but they're in the pipeline. We've already recorded various clips for them.