Trying to organize the release is proving tricky enough. It's the timing of it more than anything, trying to figure out when would suit everyone best. Neil is hoping to be home for a couple of months, maybe in May - June so if we could be ready to go then it would make most sense. Upstairs in Dolans would be the perfect venue for an album launch but we're going to have to book it soon enough, we also want to allow enough time to release a couple of songs before the launch so people will actually be aware that we exist!!

Garth Brooks has just sold around a billion tickets for his Croke Park concerts, mad stuff altogether. If we can get 60 or 70 people to our launch in Dolans we'll be a happy bunch. We could book the warehouse but that's got a capacity of around 400 so it's risky. Now, I'm really starting to think beyond the recording and what we're going to do afterwards, I have to take it one step at a time. Once we book a date for the launch we can work backwards and think about how we're going to promote it and basically spread the word. I have a chat with a friend of mine, Kieran O'Brien who knows his music and media stuff so I have a basic plan in my head now and a bit of help!

Rob is wise in the ways of iTunes and the like, he's dealt with them before. We're definitely going to release a couple of singles and have the full album on iTunes and all the online places, I don't expect that we'll sell that many but it's more about being professional and taking ourselves seriously. We've always taken our songs seriously but have never really pushed it that much. I could decide to just put the songs and the album up for free download but that's not the message I want to send out anymore. I've paid out for studio time, with a lot of help from my brothers and extra hours at work and still have to get it mixed and mastered but it sounds and feels so professional. I know if I'm going to write a follow up album I'm going to follow a similar process so I need a head start. In my head I have to make the leap, we're a professional recording band now so we have to start acting like one. If we can get between 50-100 people to download the album, sell a few singles and sell out a few gigs then we've got a good start for next years recording!!

Yeah I'm already planning the next one, I'd like to promote this album as much as possible for around a year, see what happens in the year but always preparing to record again. Again this is all up to us, we've got no record company behind us, no management company, no PR company, don't even have a manager or a promoter so even with a good album I have no idea how the hell we're ever going to get heard!! Pete likes his films and stuff. He's written and produced his own short films and is fairly nifty on the auld cameras, obviously then he's the man to shoot a couple of music videos for us. We chat a lot about the stories of the songs and how best to get the ideas across. I think the videos are going to be excellent, Pete is just brilliant at all this. We talk about doing a video for "Gathering the Sunlight", I really like this song and the story, Pete plays ukulele on this song and it sounds perfect, he understands it all and his ideas for the video are going to work perfectly, this could be our first release!!

The search for a female vocalist continues, since it's January 2014 and we're about to start recording final vocals, we have to make a decision if we're going to keep looking or just do without any female vocals at all. I love vocals, lots of vocals, I love coming up with melodies that blend with a main melody, a story behind a story, something unexpected or just something simple. Neil's got a class voice and that's going to add a different dimension to the songs anyway so not a disaster if we end up doing all the vocals ourselves.

There's a girl called Hannah coming in today for an hour or two to do some vocals and if she doesn't work out we'll probably just end our search, we've got to finish this thing soon. It's the first week of a new year and hopefully a good year. We've seen Hannah play live and heard her recorded too. The problem though is that yeah, she's got a good voice but will it work on these songs?? 

So it's now summer 2013, progress seems slow enough but in every session we record something that makes it worthwhile and keeps us looking forward to the next one. We're not recording one song at a time, we're recording all the drums and bass first, then we'll record the guitars, then the other instruments, then the vocals. The problem with recording this way is we don't even have one finished song after months in the studio, that's frustrating!!

Some people say "Everything happens for a reason", the implication is that it's all part of a bigger plan. I find that the most depressing thought I could possibly have. If your life is mapped out for you then there's no point really is there? I believe you are responsible for your own actions, you make your own luck, you decide your own life. This is the theme for the song "Let me Breathe", this is Dave's favourite song on the album, it's edgy but again it's honest, there's a lot in this song and it will sound epic if we can get it right. I'm not a fan of Religion, I'd much rather people were taught from a very early age to try and figure things out for themselves. By a million miles, the most important journey you'll ever go on is to find out who you are, you simply can never be happy, you can't ever really be at peace until you figure out who you are and you just can't be told what to believe or what to think. Lets' be honest, if you don't know right from wrong it's not Religion you're lacking!!

Peter puts down ukulele and harmonium on some of the songs, they sound excellent and they add something different. Still though, there's something missing in some songs, a violin would be perfect but we don't know a violin player. Dave knows a violin player called Podge, he plays with a band called Tractor Bomb, ahhhhh I remember now, I saw them play before and even remember that I had a quick chat with the violinist afterwards!! Dave gets in touch with him and he agrees to play on the album, we're delighted, this fella is excellent. We email him on a few songs and let him decide what he thinks would work well. He absolutely nails it, the violin gives another dimension to the album, this is really what I had in my head, it's starting to sound the way I feel.

So recording the music is going really, really well, we know what songs we're putting on it and I'm delighted with how it's written. I've managed to write the full album as one story, the album follows the roller coaster lives of a genuine, everyday couple as they struggle through modern life. Some of the lyrics are dark and hard hitting, they really hit home with me so I know other people will feel it too. Another problem though, we still don't have a female vocalist and the story doesn't work without one... the album doesn't work without one. To give some more context to the depth I've gone into for this album, I'm now starting to write and scribble notes on my fifth refill pad. I'm an old school pen and paper kind of guy, after all the effort I've put in and all the effort the lads have put in, there's no way we're falling at this hurdle.... She's out there and we'll find her..