My gut instinct is to say this album is fake. I pitched my guitar down an octave to record the bass, my electric never touched a real amp, and I’m not a trained mix technician or experienced producer; Heart Pine Valley isn’t even a real place. When I talk to friends and fellow songwriters I wax deeply poetic on subjects such as taking it slow, working multiple drafts, and not recording the first 10 songs you write, but here I am rushing out an album every month of the year and doing very little editing.
Then when I take a deep breath, roll up a little government-issue, and step back from my gut, my shameful mind, and my growing anxieties, I can recognize what this album is.
It sticks out so far, out of the album-a-month project, possibly for you because it’s the shortest. For me, it sticks out because it’s the richest. Following the trajectory of my songwriting over the years, I feel like I’ve finally arrived somewhere I really like, and can really dig what I’m seeing and hearing. Each one of these 3-or-so minute songs has a whole story surrounding it on all sides, and for those few minutes I hope to take you right down there and drop you in, then pull you out, and that world below you still spins while you’re gone. You might even want to visit more than once, see what you missed.

In another world I held on to these songs for a couple more years, went into some expensive studio with all my favourite musicians and tracked this thing, but that world is gone. Collaboration is still alive and well, but what a good song and a single mic can accomplish these days greatly outweighs, in intimacy and attitude alone, the appeal of corporate studios. I’m really interested in fostering this creative process, and I’m going to be bunkered in my tone-zone for a long while yet.

Another tone-hound got involved on this album, John McLaggan at Parachute Mastering out of New Brunswick mastered this one. At the beginning of the pandemic he was standing on his porch with a coffee, staring down the old shed in the back. He probably said something really cool and Clint Eastwood-style like ‘Your days are numbered, lumber.’ Whatever the conversation, he ripped it apart and built it back up into the incredible analog mastering studio it is today.
Mastering is an extremely subjective artform, though most people will try and tell you it’s an objective and technical field only fit for engineers and technicians. All I can say to that crowd is I know a lot of people who master and none of them wear the iron ring, if you’re smelling what I’m stepping in. John understands the musical nature of mastering, and I instantly trusted him because of his musical sense. I’m so glad and very proud to have John pass his hands over this collection.

This is starting to read like a letter-of-intent in a Gentle Giant concept album, so I’ll just ask this of you if you don’t mind: listen to this album, read the lyrics, and see where it takes you. It’s as much Gentle Giant and Thelonious Monk as it is James Taylor and Dan Reeder. I appreciate your time here so much, I really hope these songs can give something back to you in return.

Very special thanks to Emma Jane, Mom and Dad, James Sanderson, Corin Raymond, Zach Wheeler, Andy Wright, and John McLaggan