I'm getting close to recording new material with PapaTigre!. These are new songs and a new approach musically - we haven't really recorded as PT before now. It's taken a year to start defining our sound and for me to make what I was hearing in my head a reality.
I've done this throughout my musical life. Record an album, move on. I find it impossible to keep repeating the same thing. I make no claims as to whether this is a good thing or not - it's just the way I am.
As usual, I'm excited and concerned. Excited because it's another opportunity to create music of lasting worth and concerned about the results. Will I be satisfied and pleased with my music? Will the recording process capture what I'm trying to create and will that essential extra ingredient manifest itself, what I call - 'the magic'.
This is something most artists are occupied with. None of what we do matters without it. It's not quantifiable, you can't rehearse for it and you can't make it appear at will.
What I'm trying to do, as always, is be a conduit for the energy that lies behind/beyond our existence. I'm trying to genuinely touch others by providing music that illuminates some universal human experience.
Words, melody, attitude and technical ability are all part of the recipe but without the presence of what's really behind everything, it isn't the 'real deal'. That's my Holy Grail - to be the 'real deal' whenever I can. Jimi Hendrix was, Cesaria Evora was - and many other blessed/cursed artists.
My life's purpose has always been to be an artist working at that level of communication. Fame and money have never truly been my goals. The occasional pusuit of them has only been a distraction.