A Global Recording Project
A Global Recording Project
#ProjectELECTRICO is the bringing together of musicians from around the world to build a Pop record with international rhythms, flair, voices, and sounds. #ProjectELECTRICO is home to the stories behind the making of my third album, ELECTRICO, with Producer Ronan Chris Murphy (King Crimson, Ulver, Terry Bozzio, Tony Levin). #ProjectELECTRICO is a celebration (cheers, sherefè) of dialects, tunings, instruments, life—and the real people behind each voice.
“It’s a record (ELECTRICO) where it’s Western pop music, but we are taking a lot of groove and color from different places around the world. ~Ronan Chris Murphy
The “ELECTRICO” Spark
When I saw on Facebook that Ronan was going to be in Italy and France working on other music projects and doing his Home Recording Boot Camp in Northern Italy at the same time I was going to be in Spain with my fiancé, I dialed-up Ronan while he was still in L.A. and said:
Hey Ronan, I have a crazy idea…let’s do a creative-fun recording project in Italy, or Spain, or Morocco, or Turkey, or Ireland, or…wherever our heart (and logistics, and cultural immersion) takes us. Since we will both be in Europe about the same time, let’s meet overseas and make a global record, let’s bring in world cultures. ~Kathleen Blackwell (KB)
Ronan said:
Heck yeah! I love that idea! …An electro-Pop record with organic, percussive grooves and instrumentation from other parts of the world…let’s do it!” ~Ronan Chris Murphy (RCM)
I have always loved travel, world cultures, and foreign languages, so doing an album from different parts of the world did not feel foreign to me what-so-ever, actually, it just felt right. I grew up in the multi-cultural city of San Antonio, TX, I learned Spanish in College, took Latin in High School, studied Classical piano (and music theory, its own language) for 10+ years, lived in one of the biggest epicenters for multicultural immersion in the world–Los Angeles, California–backpacked in Europe for a month while in college, traveled to Europe for a month when I was 14, traveled to India, Iceland, Estonia…and needless to say, I was ready to journey the collaborative walk of music-making around the globe.
So, with my love for different cultures and musical ear in tow, our journey for #ProjectELECTRICO began.
Shortly after speaking with Ronan, I flew to Los Angeles for two days of pre-production to start to map out our journey and look at songs. I had been songwriting with Arthur in Austin, TX, so I brought some demos out to L.A. with me, and while in L.A., Ronan and I etched a basic plan to meet in Venice, Italy, to start our worldwide recording trek.
Home base for #ProjectELECTRICO is Austin, Texas, where I currently live, and Los Angeles, California, where Ronan currently lives and operates his studio (Veneto West). Ultimately, home base for #ProjectELECTRICO is anywhere that you are in the world…we’re coming to you.
7 Billion Voices. 196 Countries. One Pop Sound.
Destination: Global.
Follow the making of #ProjectELECTRICO on Twitter @KatBlackwell #GlobeTrotMusicBuzz.