‘New Album’ is where a band or artist answers some questions about their latest release. Up next is Ian Moir, who is one half of post-rock duo Into Orbit.
When/where was the new album recorded?
We recorded it in much the same way that we did our first album Caverns, self-recorded over the course of about a year in our storage unit rehearsal space in Seaview.
Who produced/engineered the album? How did the tracks come together in the studio, or at home?
Like with Caverns, I was recording engineer and we recorded the whole thing in our rehearsal space. Because we record ourselves it allows us to really take our time every step of the way, writing jamming and recording all kind of blur into one for us. We record basically everything we do and eventually demos turn into final versions. Jake Booth of Mordecai Records in Hamilton mixed the album and Mike Gibson of Munki Studios mastered it.
How did the songwriting happen? Are there any overall themes within the songs/album?
Although there’s definitely a certain feel to the visual style, song titles and atmosphere of the music, as an instrumental band we don’t have to think too deeply about themes and we like to leave it somewhat ambiguous. We wanted to continue down the path we had established with ‘Caverns’ of making dark atmospheric heavy music. As for songwriting, Paul often brings in riff ideas, and a lot of the time ideas come straight out of the free jams we have a couple of times a week. I spend a fair bit time going through our recordings arranging and expanding on ideas, so it’s a good split of us working together and separately on the material.
Were you going for a different sound/approach on this album?
Not intentionally, if anything we were trying to not sound too wildly different. We don’t do much talking or planning about what kind of songs we want to write, we just jam out every idea we have, and make songs out of the ones that fit the feel of Into Orbit. We have at least another album worth of material that didn’t make it onto Caverns or Unearthing due to being too different.
Was there any specific gear you used to capture that?
No not really, gear-wise very similar to our first album. Same recording equipment and no dramatic changes to the amps and drums we recorded with. The biggest difference to the sound of this album is due to the mixing engineer Jake, he has his own sound to his mixes and he really went the extra mile for us and got it sounding huge, especially the drum sound.
Is there a particular single/track that you feel captures the essence of the album?
Hmmm, they’re all very different, I think you really need to listen to the whole album to get the full essence. We released Dark Matter and Gilgamesh as singles in 2016. Dark Matter gives you a bit of an idea of the vibe of the album. ‘Gilgamesh’ is just a freak of a song, nothing on either album sounds like it, and I don’t know if we could write something like it again if we tried.
Is there a physical copy available? If not which digital platforms is it available on?
Yes, we have CD’s available on our Bandcamp page. And we’re taking pre-orders for vinyl copies expected to arrive mid-May. It’s also up on Spotify, iTunes, and Bandcamp.
Are you working on a video/videos for any of the songs?
There are no fixed plans yet, but a couple of months ago a prominent music video director in the UK who has worked with some big names like Mogwai and Converge contacted us saying he loves our music wants to work with us. His work is amazing, so we’re gonna apply for some NZ on Air funding and hopefully make that happen before the end of the year.