As we reach the conclusion of 2021 and finish up our yearly holiday season, it is customary to reflect upon the passing year as we look out with anticipation to the birth of a brand new one. For me, I often look at my life through the eyes of a songwriter and below is a synopsis of 2021 through those eyes.
Looking Back on 2021
2021 was a transformative year for me and I would not have forecasted where I would be today when it started. Over the course of 2021, I saw the end of a cherished personal relationship as well as the unexpected rebirth of my long dormant Kirk Ray Music Project.
In life, the end of one thing often triggers the beginning of something else, and this certainly rang true for me in 2021. The feelings I experienced as my long term relationship amicably ended triggered a shift in my songwriting which resulted in the creation of new Kirk Ray songs.
Prior to this event, most of my songwriting and free music time was devoted to other music projects like the Superjag Album Trilogy. However, this all changed in March of 2021 when my relationship ended and Kirk Ray songs started to pour out of me again.
The feeling of having new songs to record inspired me to go back and mix my old ones. Overall, I would say it was a pretty great year from a music perspective.
Unfortunately, to fully tell my 2021 story, I need to jump back a few years to place the events of 2021 into their proper context. If you want to know more about Kirk Ray and the “Born Bad” album, please keep reading.
Find a Way and the Quest for Better Production
Between 2011 and 2015, I was working a full time weekend shift which gave me three days off and a lot of free time for music. As a musician, I used this time to write and record numerous songs.
In May of 2014, I released a collection of my personal demos on an Album called “Find a Way.” At the time, the “Find a Way” album was supposed to act as a placeholder for the Kirk Ray brand while I figured out how to self produce and mix more professional sounding tracks. Deep down, I wasn’t happy with how “Find a Way” sounded, so I never promoted the album and immediately started to work on the next one.
After “Find a Way,” my production abilities improved over the course of the second half of 2014. In fact, most of 2021’s “Born Bad” album would come from these sessions. However, back in 2014, I never dreamed that it would take so long to release a follow up album. During the second half of 2014, I pushed hard to get 10 songs completed for a 2015 release and I seemed to be on track to make that happen.
Born Bad and the Beginning of the Great Hiatus
In the fall of 2014, I recorded a live studio take of a song called “Born Bad” to a click track. Unbeknownst to me at the time, this track would become the last fully recorded Kirk Ray song until the summer of 2021.
At the beginning of 2015, I switched jobs to pursue the next step in my career, and my new gig didn’t leave much time for music. As the new job consumed more and more of my free time and energy, the muse left me and I went into a long period of lyrical writer’s block (aka The Great Hiatus). During the Great Hiatus, music ideas would still flow, but I was unable to write any complete song lyrics that I was happy with for my solo project.
My Music Activities During the Great Hiatus
Around the fall of 2015, I started collaborating with my friend Greg on the Superjag project. Greg is a great lyricist and we had a lot of fun making music together. The project allowed me to focus on music and production while simultaneously relieving me of any solo lyrical responsibilities. Superjag music is very different from the Kirk Ray Project, and it has its own unique vibe to it. To date, Superjag has recorded and released three independent albums.
As time passed, my lyrical writer’s block started to fade around the Spring of 2019, and lyrics started to flow effortlessly again. However, to get the lyrics flowing again, I had to do something musically different. In 2019 and 2020, I was feeling nostalgic for some 90’s Alternative Rock, so I ended up writing and recording a lot of 90’s style music with a Seattle vibe to it. In total, I recorded around two albums in this style. These tracks will likely get released as a side project sometime in 2022 since the music doesn’t really fit with the overall Kirk Ray sound.
2021 Rebirth and the End of the Great Hiatus
In the summer of 2021, I started working on fresh mixes of my old Kirk Ray demos. The quality of the mixes started to improve greatly, and the excitement of hearing the old tracks in a new light encouraged me to work harder on the project. In August of 2021, I took a vacation and used the time to record some new Kirk Ray songs. As a curiosity, I also recorded some new versions of songs from the “Find a Way” album. The vacation sessions turned into 10 of the best tracks I have ever recorded, and I expect that I will be releasing them as an album sometime in 2022.
Born Bad Returns
Upon returning home from my vacation, I became determined to finish the incomplete album from 2014 before the end of the year.
Towards this goal, I went through my music archive and found two incomplete sessions from the 2014 time period that needed vocals. I worked diligently to complete the two sessions and the track listing for the “Born Bad” album started to materialize.
As the weeks of archive work turned into months, the “Born Bad” album came to fruition when the final mix of “Night Still Young” was completed.
Given the story of the album and the long dormancy related to its creation, “Born Bad” just seemed like a fitting title for the collection of songs. Shortly before Christmas, I finished the mastering process, and quietly released the “Born Bad” album as a catalyst to get things moving again for the Kirk Ray music project.
Conclusion
If you read this far, I thank you for your time and interest. In many ways, I am writing this for my own enjoyment and to have something to look back on in the future. In a way, this blog may end up becoming a diary of my music activities. If you enjoy my music and the nostalgia it can invoke, please stay tuned as there will be more coming.
