Album Art for Darren Borg - Moments

I have been asked once again to create album art for one of my all-time favorite electronic artists Darren Borg. Having created the artwork for his previous two releases, 2012's The Beginning and the End and 2013's The Restoration of Abbie's I was very excited to have the chance to complete a trilogy with Darren. The first piece was based on a microscopy photo, the second a play on the vastness of space and time so I wanted to place this cover here and now and in our human scale. It just so happened that Darren wanted to name the album Moments and the first thing I thought of was seeing that term in the Apple Photos App on a daily basis so I knew I had to start with a photo... And having already used blue for the first cover and red/yellow for the second, I knew I wanted to go green.

While on a family outing through downtown Seattle, my wife driving, my 12 year old daughter shotgun and my 20-month old son and I in the middle row of our mini van I snapped a photo of the skyline through the rainy window. 

Seattle from the backseat...

I enhanced the photo and put a filter on it in the native camera app and sent it to Darren to see if it spoke to him in any way... He said he loved it and was very interested to see what I would do with it. My first thought was to use the app Decim8 which is a great photo glitch app that yields really interesting results so I went to the App Store to download it and randomly came across an app called D3LTA which looked interesting. After playing around with it for awhile I came up with several different versions of the photo which I then manipulated in Photoshop to get to the proper dimensions for an album cover. 

The trick to obtaining intricate results with D3LTA is running the filtered photo through the filter a second or third or fourth time...

Now here is the trick when working with clients... don't show them all of the versions that you make right away... only show them your top 2 or three at first. Every time I have broken this rule the client has chosen my least favorite design and I have had to finish out the project with less enthusiasm than I might have had otherwise. In this case I picked only 3 of the 12 designs to send to Darren, all of which I really liked. The nice thing about having the rest of these designs on hand, especially for album art, is that they can be used for other things, like the other pages in the digital booklet for liner notes or stickers, posters, gig flyers, Facebook headers, webpage graphics, etc... 

So Darren picked his favorite and it was time to do the typography. Because I had already established a typographic style with the last two albums I immediately went to using that style as a default... I mean this was album three in the series so the typography had to be the same right? The more I pushed the text around the page I just kept feeling like it was not the way to go. I decided to choose a different typeface and style the text differently to fit better with the design that Darren had picked out. It didn't take very long for the final design to reveal itself... Darren is very happy with the final result and I am too...

Darren Borg Moments - Album art by Kurt Lorenz

You can learn more about the album and and get links to downloads from www.embermusic.com.

"Into Air" release available now...

My track "Into Air,"  a collaboration with fellow Ember Music artist Coreena is available now. It is the lead track on Coreena's latest EP entitled Collabs + Remixes

coreena.bandcamp.com

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Featuring collabs with Richie Dagger’s Crime, Modal Morphosis, Noisegasm, Ember Music artists Kurt Lorenz and (my other musical projectThe Never Were and remixes by Kjell, Stan Dart and J. Ohm.

I composed and performed the instrumental track and posted it online... Coreena heard it and asked if she could add vocals. She sent me her vocal recordings and I mixed the track... 

The EP has received several favorable reviews including a 10/10 review by Canadian music mag CPG. 

 "This EP is the most forward thinking piece we have heard this year. Coreena has the voice that is and will rise through the electronic genre ranks and our predictions are that she will be obtaining many requests for track features in the near future.

This EP is not your typical piece of electronic music. It's experimental, deep, dark, groovy, and sonically rich in sound. Each track has its place yet molds into one another like an extended set. Our favorite track was "Into Air". This spiritual trip of simple sounds makes you feel like it is never ending. The progression of quality sounds really hits the mind where it is necessary and is perfect food for the mind, body and soul."

Rating: 10/10

 cpgmag.ca/album/coreena-collabs-remixes-exclusive/

2015?

So here we are... I have just completed a massive year-long project and I'm ready to start on a new musical adventure. 

Over the last few years I have been working with my good friend Joe Love on an electronic- industrial project called The Never Were. We have a bunch of songs in demo form and I really like the direction it is going. 

I'm going to spend the majority of my music time this year on The Never Were as we still have much to do. There will be guitar recording sessions, lyric writing and vocal sessions... Rewrites, edits and all of the producing that goes with it. Most of which is new-ish territory for me.

wish me luck.. 

Kurt Lorenz & Daniel Davis - LIVE - 2014-09-27

My fellow Ember Music artist Daniel Davis and I recently played a live electronic soundtrack to the 1985 cult-classic anime film Angel's Egg (天使のたまご Tenshi no Tamago). The event was the first show in what we hope will become a series of shows at the amazing Scarecrow Video in Seattle entitled "Live Soundtracks to Strange Films."

More Album Art for Ember Music Artist Darren Borg

I have created another piece of album art for my friend and label-mate Darren Borg.

The Restoration of Abbie’s is the first full-length album from Darren and is an impressive collection of deep, atmospheric electronica. This follow up to 2012′s The Beginning and the End EP sees Darren pushing his signature sound in new directions. The album is available now via Bandcamp.

New Release of Old Material

I am happy to announce my latest release Isaz, a 4 track EP featuring experiments in sound, processed loops and field recordings. All of these tracks were conceptualized, recorded, programmed, and mixed between January and September 2009. Available now as a free download from Bandcamp.

Isaz - Track by Track

01. This is just my voice

This is just a looping, processed sample of me saying "this is just my voice" 

02. Cargo

Processed sample of a train running through Carkeek Park in Seattle, WAUSA. This track was recorded with an M-Audio MicroTrack II digital recorder using the standard t-microphone. I used Ableton Live 6 for processing through an Auto Filter, a Simple Delay and a Resonator.

03. Batavia

This is the soundtrack to a memory. Flying in my fathers small plane from Buffalo. NY to Batavia, IL. when I was 6 years old. A mix of excitement and utter dread. I feel like I captured those feelings in this track.

04. Eye

Original Experimental Music/Sound (by Kurt Lorenz) made completely on the iPhone using BeatMaker, NLogSynth, and iGendyn. (Slo-Mo Vocalizations are from the videos audio track.) Each app was recorded directly into an audio channel in Ableton Live and some basic mixing/compression applied. This track is the soundtrack to an experimental film I created entitled "Eye" you can see the video below or here: www.vimeo.com/5243888


eye from Kurt Lorenz on Vimeo.

"Filament" Makes the Top Ten List at Astreaux World

My track "Filament" (from Ember Music Volume 1) came in at #5 on the Astreaux World Top Ten List for the week of October 31, 2011. This list is generated weekly from a ranking based on listener votes in the Live365 playlist window. "Thumbs Up" or Down, Wishlist, and "Buy" clicks all contribute to a songs rankings.

Astreaux World... for the finest in ambient, new age, space and experimental music. A spacially refreshing audio sensation. Out of this world!

Ember Music Featured on Solipsistic Nation Podcast

I was interviewed with my Ember Music co-founder Bill Bendrot (MobiusB) on this weeks edition of the Solipsistic Nation Podcast.

SOLIPSISTIC NATION NO. 251: EMBER MUSIC

 

Solipsistic NATION was a two hour radio show that broadcast the very best of all genres of electronic music from Free Radio San Diego 96.9 FM every Sunday night from 10 PM – 12 AM.

Sadly, after a year of making the airwaves of San Diego throb with the sounds of solipsistic NATION show host Bazooka Joe had to give the show up due to time constraints. A little over a year later he was back in action, only this time by podcasting the show once a week!

If you want to be sure to receive each episode we recommend subscribing to the solipsistic NATION feed. If you have the latest version iTunes on your computer, click here to subscribe.

 

Ember Music Volume 1 - The First Review...

Katie Weed has reviewed our compilation Ember Music Volume 1 on her blog Sights and Sounds Dovetail 

"This first release by nonprofit label Ember Music is the rare find among multi-artist compilations that plays like a cohesive album rather than the disjointed offerings of its individuals. From the pensive introduction ("Huntitled III" by musician Murat Esmer) to the dark, haunted coda by New Englander MobiusB, the listener is led seamlessly through tracks that manage to differ vastly from one to the next without sacrificing unity. The album plays not only as a whole, but as an intelligent and detailed statement. We are taken on a dark, occasionally gloomy, but always thoughtful tour through this collection."

Read the full review here.

Ember Music Volume 1: Released 01/01/11

As co-founder, curator, art director and artist for Ember Music, I am very proud to announce that our first official release, Ember Music – Volume 1, is now available on Bandcamp at http://embermusic.bandcamp.com.

The compilation features works by Murat Esmer, Carl Sagan’s Ghost, Known Rebel, Akisma, Kurt Lorenz, Mr. Sandbags, Saffron Slumber, Savaran, Nordmach, TraisKin, Slaphappy Mortician and MobiusB.

The album is available for purchase for $6.99 through Bandcamp with a full streaming preview available.

Ember Music Volume 1 will be available through iTunes, Amazon, eMusic, Spotify, and other digital stores in the coming weeks. We will also have a limited number of physical CDs available for sale in February 2011.