Stillscreen

Stillscreen came out in Dublin during early spring time 2008, after departing from a highly promising post-punk band. Initially the basic idea with Stillscreen was creating guitar-based songs very rich in sonic-harmonies, using open chords to play hypnotical riffs, with the help of some delay and fuzz pedal of course. Actually the first six or seven songs were achieved just in one saturday afternoon with an 'unplugged' Fender Telecaster strummed fiercely, then in the following days by playing them through some effects and a Roland MicroCube amp they found their own 'ethereal' shape.
That was the 'basic' idea though, the 'proper' one was finding a singer and songwriter to give a soul/life to the songs, so a myspace page was needed to have something recorded that people could listen to and judge and to see what their feedback was, as well as handy to find a singer/songwriter . So the recording process came out, which revolutionized the initial idea, as drum-machine patterns where added and so was effects-manipulation in real-time, things that you cannot do while playing a chords set. So at that stage only two of the songs that came out from that 'saturday unplugged session' got onto recording, which were "Horses" and "Secrets" (although I believe Secrets was achieved months earlier if I'm not wrong). The song "Stillscreen" was just a loop of a fragment of a loop that came out while experimenting with an Akai HeadRush pedal and recorded onto tape, so I wanted to keep it as it had that kind of gentle and scary mood at the same time, and I called it instantly same as the name for the band, or 'project' and thought it was just the natural thing to do with it. Ok, so with these three songs ready to go, a myspace page was created in September 2008. The initial feedback from people listening was very positive and encouraging to record more, especially with "Horses" that someone found it very groovy and unlikely to sound like aything else. So at that time I was in contact with a girl who possibly wanted to sing on the songs, so for the next recording, instead of using one of the old guitar-based songs I wanted to record a new one, using a keyboard layer that came out years earlier while messing with a new Roland Juno-D. Then "Coralline L." was created, using that old keyboard part and adding electric-guitar, bass, and a ripetitive drum pattern triggered into a Line6 DL4 (my Zoom drum-machine had only one free pattern left, so I couldn't use more). Anyway "Coralline L." had a very huge impact to some people, mostly to people into TheCure or CocteauTwins, but for some people more into rocky stuff it wasn't really the case to hail a little. After that it seemed that none wanted to sing on te songs, so I was in the middle of starting a remix project for an Irish indie band, therefore I wanted to record a new song, the most 'ethereal' I could, thus "A Good Kissing Time (It'd Be)" came out just in one Sunday; I think I started recording it around 1pm and finished and mastered it at around 7pm. There I used only a guitar loop surrounded by loads of effects and a single Roland MC-303 drum pattern. With that song my idea was a concept EP, possibly called "Kisses EP", and so on recording another two different versions, perhaps one in brackets like (It's Been) and the other (It Was). It hasn't taken shape yet but it's still in the draw. With that description it is clear that it was inspired by those kinds of moments everyone have while dealing with their own longing feelings towards someone very special. Perhaps too romantic but natural at the same time. At that stage it was clear that Stillscreen would be (for a while at least) an instrumental one-man band, mainly centered to the use of loops and effects processing in real time and with no compromises of song lenght, so a period where Stillscreen became S-XRN* (a diluted version of what Stillscreen was meant to be at the beginning) took place. With that set-up on 8 August 2010 I went to video record "TheOffsetConductance" and "TheValenceShell" live as part of "TheSteveLSession" on SoundStudioRecords studio, where also TheNorthernDrones and MiaSparrow rehearsed. With "TheOffsetConductance" I was quite sure about what to play and how it should sound, a gentle arpeggio in loop with a lo-fi synth layer, both suddenly submerged by a huge shower of distorsion and feedback, then ending with kinda cheap techno drum beats. With "TheValenceShell" instead, I only started messing with an old synth-arpeggio with a Roland 303 used on one of my early recordings (around 1998 I think), then looping it and adding a casual drum pattern, still from the 303, it suited the song perfectly, I was fortunate with that. The titles of these two songs were inspired by my electronics studies I was involved at the time, especially with "TheValenceShell" that is clear that is related to 'the atom', with "TheOffsetConductance" instead, I thought about the loops that are included and that make the spine of the song that aren't always 'in set', then as it keeps increasing in dynamics but still with loops not 'in set', therefore "TheOffsetConductance". Back there and still with no gigs sought for, I felt I could explore different territories, it was Autumn 2010 and I was a lot into Andrew Weaterhall, so in a period of two weeks, I recorded around ten hours of house music, thus a 10 Track Demo came out, and a copy reached Weaterhall as well, but it's difficult to say if it reached his player too. Four of those were uploaded to the myspace player, with very little responses, anyhow someone was stunned by hearing those crazy tracks with talkative effects that played so loudly for the first time. Someone else instead, said that I definitely was in some kind of 'synthetic' drug, probably the ones more devoted to the usual 'ethereal' and 'romantic' vein ; well, I wasn't and I'm very proud of what came out, especially with "TheWhiteSpiritFactory", no bass, only drums and effects in good sync. After that HouseSession I moved a bit away from S-XRN* and focused on other electro/industrial projects, which kept me busy for the whole Winter. So back rehearsing as Stillscreen around March 2011, spring-time, the idea there was going live for the first time, thus within a week the songs "TheMother" and "TheFather" took shape. Again concepts and loops, but only one distortion pedal this time, the ProcoTurboRat. "TheMother" came out from a riff I played with acoustic guitar; it had that kind of MyBloodyValentine flavour so I thought it could possibly have something very potential with electric guitar, and so it had. "TheFather" instead came out from "TheMother"; I needed to find a final 'coda' for "TheMother" that sounded a bit 'sinister', so "TheFather" kind of 'showed-up' from next room, and all the developments like guitar parts, soloes, manipulations seemed to be very natural as if they were already made, so instintively the names and the concept for these songs seemed to be there already : "Your mother will always feed you and always cuddle you whenever you want, but your father is responsible of your good education and may slap your face sometime..." "TheFather" also may be vaguely attributed to 'priests' or Catholicism, which sound 'gothic' and because the latest breaking news, very 'sinister' as well. Initially these two songs were around twenty miutes long each, but as a third song came out, it was eventually needed to shorten them to fifteen. Eventually I went to SoundStudioRecords studio on May Monday bankholiday evening to record live these two songs, and mastered in my home-studio few days later, but dropped the idea of keeping "TheFather" as thought wasn't really played well.
The new song "HawaiianTrees" was achieved with the same aptitude as for the previous two, working on a single loop, and with the same rig of effects pedals. It stands up a from the two others as it has a very uplifting and empirical moments, very summerish song, so here we aren't too far from the usual Stillscreen romanticism. With these three songs a chance to play the first gig took place, and that would have been in Whelans on the 19th of August (supporting LowSea), so a FaceBook page was created to invite people to that performance which was called "Still-Machine-Muzak", as partly inspired by LouReed's "MetalMachineMusic". So the live performance started around midnight and lasted around fifty minutes. I was afraid I would have looked arrogant playing a whole gig on my own, but I wanted to forget that and got very excited as I started playing, so excited that it looked I played only for ten minutes. Anyway it gave good impression to someone saying that I should play more gigs, recalling bands like Mogwai, GodspeedYou!BlackEmperor and PinkFloyd, so I feel very grateful with them and especially with LowSea's sound engineer who really helped me a lot in the set-up, and of course TheNorthernDrones for the amps.

Quite extended as biography but it is the real thing, I forgot to mention that if it didn't happen too much in 2009 is because I was playing guitar and bass for the band TheFiregazers with whom I recorded the EP "NeverLateToSmile", and forgot about Miranda as well who sometimes came to the studio adding some vocals .

Now Stillscreen is currently demoing the performance "Still-Machine-Muzak" which includes the songs that are going to be played live, so promoters or whoever who wants Stillscreen live, please send an email to

stillscreen.music[at]gmail.com

Keep It Natural, & In Real Time!
Mick Wasteland/Stillscreen/S-XRN*
Dublin, 1 October 2011