JOE MCGURK - MYTHS AND LEGENDS

In Joe's own words:

I have always wanted to take the plunge and learn how to mix and master but the months of lockdown forced this to happen sooner than anticipated. Home recording and production was the only option out there and the timing felt right to work on a new solo album after the exciting reception of the latest Operose album. As time goes by, I have become more and more interested in building tracks through orchestration and enjoy creating lots of atmosphere for melodic guitar to blend into, with the occasional rather than constant technical section bursting through. I feel that this is where this album differs from my previous, as each song has a stronger orchestral backbone and sounds complete without the guitars, allowing for more breathing space in the tracks and in turn for hopefully more effective quality rather than quantity when the guitar does come in.
The overall atmosphere is quite dark, attempting to play on the folklore narrative of Myths and Legends, a title that I had in mind long before the tracks were written. Usually I am quite reactive with album titles fitting a collection of songs but this one was definitely proactive as I love this topical area. The production is the start of a journey, it is a debut with regards to sound but a third album with regards to instrumental composition. My goal is to work harder and harder to bring these two elements in line and hopefully this is a prelude to something bigger. On a final note, I enjoyed breaking away from how I usually score
orchestral tracks by hand, branching out to even performing piano and keys in several of the tracks.