Whew. Our new album is out, and boy oh boy, was this was a big undertaking. We started writing this album back in the summer of 2013, but the big writing push started in the 2013/2014 winter. It’s not easy to rehearse and arrange material when your band members each live in a different country – so that meant that for the most part, we did all the arrangements and compositions using Ableton Live, or Apple Logic, or via some other means of digital composition.

I will say that rehearsing and recording an album is challenging when you don’t all live in the same city. We really had to set aside a serious chunk of time and make our lives about this album throughout the few weeks leading up to our recording date. We had written a lot of the material before we began rehearsing it, but from the first rehearsals until the last day of tracking was only about three weeks. In that time span, we had to arrange all of it, internalize the parts, capture the vibe, and decide how to approach tracking it all in 2 days. It was exhausting. But even in that short time span, you have to do daily progress checks and continuously evaluate everything. It can be a discouraging process, but you have to keep plowing through. We actually ended up scratching 2-3 tunes because they didn’t fit the overall statement we were trying to make.

After recording, we again took the album to Sam Minaie in New York for post-production and mixing. Sam was a huge factor in shaping Synesthesia, so we definitely wanted him to work with us again on Somnambulist. The mixing was definitely a big part of how this record is shaped. It took us about 4 weeks to mix it.

I think its somewhat ironic that we named this album Somnambulist as we were all pretty much nervous insomniacs throughout the entire rehearsal/recording/mixing and artwork process. However, it came out really great. Please check it out when you have a chance.

It’s only been out for a few days, but already we’re seeing signs of potential for this new album. Bandcamp.com is displaying the record on their homepage as a “New and Notable Record,” and we’ve just finished doing an interview for Igloo Magazine that should be coming out in the next week or so.

We’re looking forward to the next few months and seeing where the momentum from this release can take us. Already we have 3 tours scheduled: US/Canada dates in March, Europe dates in April, and May. Check back here regularly for the updated schedules as they become available.

For more about this record, visit www.thekandinskyeffect.com