Let me begin by noting that my final National Novel Writing Month word count was 51,807, marking my third successful NaNoWriMo. The story is basically done. There are a few scenes that need some filling in once I have gone back and reread it, analyzed what did and what did not work in the plot structure, and reevaluated the roles the characters really play in the overall development. For the time being, that is all that I am going to say about it, other than that it is a noir story tentatively titled Death is My Job.

Now it is December, though. Since the month of novel writing is over, I can finally devote my creative energy to the album that I have been working on all year. The last few nights I have sat down for the first time in over a month and worked on that. I made some decent progress on the opening track. It still needs more work, but one of the core themes is worked out now, I think, as is a really nice string figure. As I often do these days, I did my writing on guitar and then scored what I worked out so that it will be easy to make changes as the piece develops. When I am done with everything, I will go back and record live guitars.

Here is the road map for the tracks on the new album. I am not giving any titles yet. Even though I am blogging this, I do like to keep some secrets.

1. This track is moving forward well. Right now it is a bit repetitive, so I need to work out a way to work in more movement.
2. Right now I only have vague ideas. I had a flash of inspiration in the shower a month or so ago, but it was gone by the time I sat down to record it. This one is likely to be the hardest, since it will be substantially different from all of the other tracks, and making it fit in with the rest of the album will be tough. The rest of the album is very minimal and soundtrack-y. The first part of this is more of a rocker.
3. This used to be integrated with the next track. When I was in Boulder with Kristi in October, I decided that it should be its own piece. The sounds did not translate from Garage Band to Logic and I also want to replace the synth pad with a string part. I am going to use this work as an opportunity to make another pass at this. The same idea, but hopefully something better realized. A few evenings of work will probably have this ready to be demoed.
4. This piece for guitar and piano is pretty much done. When I moved it over to Logic, I stripped out the synth pad and also expanded it slightly in the middle section. I think that this works even better now than it did before. This is the piece that has set the bar for the rest of the album and has slowed down progress so much.
5. I am imagining this to be along the lines of k | drouble, but expanded and with more movement. If I just sat down with this for a few evenings, this would be done.
6. The concept of this one has evolved significantly since I started working on the album. I am now envisioning this as a light and positive piece. Other than that vague statement, I do not have any of this worked out. This will likely be one of the most difficult pieces to write.

I plan to have tracks 3, 5, and possibly 1 largely wrapped up by this time next week. Wish me luck on that.

Tschuess.