I've always been a huge fan of progressive rock. Though I only had limited recording experience, default plug-ins and a budget of about $350, I decided to make an album. In 2014 I starting getting ideas. Several grew into many. I wanted to create a concept album that pulled styles and moods from my favorite bands such as pink floyd, porcupine tree, transatlantic, etc. Over the course of about 3 years I worked on it casually as a side project every week or two.

The album has a loose 'plot' as well as some parallels with my own life and story. It has a lot of different moods and progressions. There are several different melodies and motifs that appear throughout the album; the sort of thing I love that my favorite progressive rock bands do. Originally the album was going to be four 20 minute songs. However, my 4 gigs of ram couldn't handle that so it got turned into 23 tracks. It was probably for the best however.

Everything, on this album was done by me (with the exceptions listed in the credits near the bottom). I did all of the instrumentation. The guitar and bass was aux direct-in. The midi keyboards were played and the acoustic guitar was mic'd with an SM57 (my only microphone lol). Almost all of the vocals are me with either my SM57 mic or my friends higher quality microphone. Thank you Daniel Murphy for letting me borrow your vocal microphone!!! And the drums were played by me on my MIDI keyboard and then edited.
I used Cubase 6

Ideas for the future? I have a lot of material--at least two albums worth of content on the back-burner. However, I want my next album to be properly produced, mixed and mastered and have real drums; though I may release single songs that are of the same quality as my album before then.

I did this album with limited knowledge and resources. Some people might advocate that one should only release a musical product that's produced with the highest quality. However, my album would have never gotten done if that were the case for me. From the beginning I had the mindset that I'm going to do the best with the tools and knowledge that I had while keeping it as a side hobbie.

I would like to form a band and get a proper lead vocalist. However, only time will tell if that will happen.

Also, it would be nice to re-release my album 'between the lines'. Whether that be properly mixed and mastered, or simply re-done from top to bottom. AND WITH REAL DRUMS!!! not with midi drums...

A little bit about me...

Born and raised outside of Orlando, I've lived my entire life there. I'm very much into hobbies. I enjoy music, of course, as well as many other things. I love to bass fish and spend time with nature. I enjoy nerdy things like star wars and lotr. I'm very active in my faith and I'm a practicing Catholic. I also love watching competitive super smash brothers melee and used to regularly attend tournaments.

I've been playing guitar since I was 13, piano since I was 14. I spent some time learning bass guitar when I was 21 and played a lot for about a year. I have a grasp of percussion and I like playing the djembe a lot. I interned at a recording studio for 6 months. I've had Cubase since 2009 and I've casually spent a lot of working on various things for fun. I released two electronica albums in 2012 and 2013 respectively. Essentially, they were doodles I made and then had the gall to release them across the internet. This is before I knew what mastering was...

Album Credits:

A lot of people participated in different ways on my album. Though I was the mastermind and wrote everything I did have many friends have guest appearances on it. Also, my dad wrote one of the jazzy songs 'The Ghost and the Rider'. Thank you to everyone who played with me!!!

All writing, production, instrumentation, vocals, mixing and mastering--and anything else--were all done by me except for the following...

Album Cover Art by Laurin Rinder

his website: www.rinderart.com

Album cover edited by Michael Prevosk and editing and band logo by Zoe Papas

check out their websites respectively at michaelprevosk.com and www.zoepapasart.com

'A Million Lives' featured excerpts of poetry written by Troy Cunio from his book Inkstained Heartbeats from the poem 'The Lighthouse at the End of Earth'

'The Shadows in Me' Guitar Solo - Cody Singleton and me trading off with him starting the first part

'The Window Frame' Chorus Vocals - Daniel Murphy

'The Jams'

guitar solo starting at 1:13 is by Matt Fowler from the band bothering dennis www.facebook.com/botheringdennis/

guitar solo starting at 2:14 is by Cody Singleton from the band www.facebook.com/flagmanband/

Outro and vocals/ambient talking starting at 7:04 written by Zachary Olsen

'The Ghost and the Rider'

-written by my dad, Mark Murley

'Fall Into the Future' Drums written/inspired by Jackson Core and inputted by me via MIDI; bass inspired by Sam Stewart as well as outro rhythm written by him. The song was written by me with my former band Apollo Radio helping in the layout process www.facebook.com/apolloradioband/

'A Giant Squid' - about half of the bass is played by Sam Stewart including the bass solo starting at 1:15 check out his band Flagman at www.facebook.com/flagmanband/

Cubase, mixing and mastering advice from my former boss George York who is founder and ceo of YRS MIDI systems yrsmidisystems.com

2 hour mastering lesson and occasional consultations from my bandmate Louis Richner who is founder and ceo of Paradise Studios www.paradisestudiosfl.com/whoweare (the quality of his productions are a lot higher than mine fyi lol)

if you're into Christian music you can check out our band Eleva at www.elevamusic.com and www.facebook.com/ElevaOfficial/



Music Notes:

The Electric guitar used on the entire album (minus guest solos) was my 1988 Fender Stratocaster.

The bass guitar was almost entirely my friends american fender jazz bass. Thank you Sam Stewart!!!

My ibanez soundgear bass also makes an appearance or two

The acoustic guitar was an Applause


The guitars and bass used either one or a combination from below

G2.1u guitar pedal
VST Amp Rack (default plug-in for Cubase 6)
Spider Line 6 Amp Head

All keys were either

HALion Sonic
HALion Sonic SE
Sonik Synth II

The Drums were HALion Sonic using the kit 'Vintage Ambience kit'

All mixing was done by me.

All mastering was done by me with my friend Louis helping me establish a working pre-set using Izotop Ozone 7