Devin Townsend

Devin just posted this the other day.



Guess it's a studio goof, them covering this song:

A glimpse into the future. Maybe.





Devin says: "Heres a small taste of a ton of stuff I have on the go... all demos for 4 or 5 different projects. All of this stuff may get used or get scrapped. No idea yet."

Some really cool stuff there. The second video might be of his Casualties of Cool project. Not sure. And..."We Like to Party."

I find it refreshing that someone of Devin's talent and intensity hasn't become an egotistical, pompous git. Most do. The new stuff all sounds interesting as ever.

Promo release from the upcoming Blu Ray/DVD/CD The Retinal Circus



This is going to rock!

Saw that when it was released. TONS of post-production on it, like most live albums. It'll be cool enough, I guess.

"Grace" is a brilliant song, though.

You know, Devin is one of all-time favorite musicians. You'll be hard pressed to find me saying anything negative about the guy, but...the more I see of this Retinal Circus, the cheesier it seems. Yeah, they were going for something big and theatrical, but it comes off more like a high-school play. Incidentally, I think Devin pretty much admitted to this in a recent interview.

Still hard to watch without cringing a bit. Haha. And I know these songs way too well. Very little sounds live. Much of this stuff is straight from the source.

Eyesore wrote:

Very little sounds live. Much of this stuff is straight from the source.

That's a shame, recent live DVD releases by Steven Wilson, Porcupine Tree and Opeth have been completely live with mistakes left in and enough differences in arrangements to make them unique live experiences (including broken guitar strings and amplifier malfunctions in the Opeth concert).

S.D. wrote:

Eyesore wrote:

Very little sounds live. Much of this stuff is straight from the source.

That's a shame, recent live DVD releases by Steven Wilson, Porcupine Tree and Opeth have been completely live with mistakes left in and enough differences in arrangements to make them unique live experiences (including broken guitar strings and amplifier malfunctions in the Opeth concert).  

It is. I suspect part of the reason it's like this is because Devin was going for spectacle and visuals over the live experience. I know he uses backing tracks in a live setting because his music is so multi-layered, but I don't know...it's just a shame seeing Anneke either lip-syncing or seeing that her live vocals were replaced with the studio track in post-production.

Devin is great live, so there must be some reason he went this route. Especially since he's always been a guy who wants things to be as real and honest as possible.

Boris2008 wrote:

Promo release from the upcoming Blu Ray/DVD/CD The Retinal Circus



This is going to rock!

What the actual F*ck did I just watch.

Some technical stuff went wrong on the night that I don't pretend to understand, this all was there to be seen on the live stream, but people still really want the DVD so I think that he's done his best. It is all a bit cheesey (If you've seen the schlock with Jed) but I'm still really looking forward to my copy although I don't expect it to match the By a Thread sets.

It looks like my old college worship team on cocaine and gin.

Boris2008 wrote:

Some technical stuff went wrong on the night that I don't pretend to understand, this all was there to be seen on the live stream, but people still really want the DVD so I think that he's done his best. It is all a bit cheesey (If you've seen the schlock with Jed) but I'm still really looking forward to my copy although I don't expect it to match the By a Thread sets.

Well, if there were technical issues, then I can understand. This was a one-time deal, mucho expensive to do even in this limited high-school theater capacity. If shit went wrong, then I guess there was no choice.

Here's another demo from the Epicloud sessions. It was given away on a memory stick given to those who bought VIP tickets to the Retinal Circus show.



Something tells me Devin was trying out some new software. Haha. Can't say I'm a fan, but even this is catchy as hell.

I kind of want Devin to do a completely electronic record at some point, but this is enough to make me change my mind. It's pretty horrible!  

Boris2008 wrote:

I kind of want Devin to do a completely electronic record at some point, but this is enough to make me change my mind. It's pretty horrible!  

Do you have the Project EKO EP that was included with the limited edition version of Accelerated Evolution? It's all loop-based ambient stuff.

The reason I wonder if "Buddha Bidet" is the product of Devin trying out software, is because that's what the Project EKO thing was.



It's actually a pretty cool EP. A lot like latter-day Delerium.

That's much better! Still sounds a bit like tinkering but if he were to really go for an electronic album, I'm sure that it could be fantastic!

Soo, this one has got me wondering as this record will not be coming out as an InsideOut release, instead they are going to do a Kickstarter campaign in order to get the record out/make a video etc...

While I think that Devin is tailor made for successful crowd funded releases, I do hope that it isn't a case of Century Media not thinking that it's good enough to put out!

Boris2008 wrote:

Soo, this one has got me wondering as this record will not be coming out as an InsideOut release, instead they are going to do a Kickstarter campaign in order to get the record out/make a video etc...

While I think that Devin is tailor made for successful crowd funded releases, I do hope that it isn't a case of Century Media not thinking that it's good enough to put out!

Well, Devin initially self-released his pretty much every solo release up until Terria, I believe. Either way, I would bet Century Media, Inside Out, or numerous other labels would put this out; but he's going to make tons more money by crowd-funding what will essentially be a niche release. If Ginger is pulling in about $500,000 per crowd-funded campaign, Devin will probably do just as much. Far better option for him than going the traditional route.

Yeah, I totally agree, I think he'll do brilliantly as most people with a loyal and open minded support base do (Ginger Wildheart, Amanda Palmer) just seems a little odd after doing so much with Inside Out.

Either way I'll be pledging and looking forward to the album.

Apparently there's meant to be a bit of a Ki vibe to Casualties - that alone has got me rather excited for it. I still think Ki is potentially one of Devin's finest albums, but I'm not sure many would agree. Doing it as a Pledge campaign will definitely go fine - let's hope it mirrors Ginger's campaigns more than Palmer's though (big fan of Palmer and Theatre Is Evil was incredible, but I found her campaign just a bit... grating, for some reason).

Just going back to the Retinal Circus stuff above, if I remember correctly there was quite a lot of sampling in the background at the show itself, presumably because they couldn't afford to get it wrong. So all the choirs were definitely pre-recorded, with the people on stage mimicking it. It's been a while since I watched the DVD back, but it didn't seem particularly like she had her studio tracks replacing her performance - she was pretty incredible on the night. I imagine there probably was a fair amount of overall editing done anyway, as there were quite a few unfortunately big screw ups on the night. All the Steve Vai clips, for instance, were heinously out of sync with their audio throughout the show, for instance. I also remember one of the gymnasts during 'Grace' getting stuck on her rope.

To be honest, it was a goofy as hell show and definitely a bit cheesy, but similarly, it was rather brilliant. One of my favourite musicians at probably my favourite venue - it was hard not to enjoy it!

From the sample, there is definitely a Ki vibe there. And you're right, Ki is one of Devin's best works. It ranks up right up there with the first four (excluding Punky Bruster), in my opinion. The stuff that came after Terria is surely no less great, but I don't think any of those albums have a distinct separation from other things he's done. Ki was something totally different, like Ocean Machine, Infinity, Physicist, and Terria.

I think that's a good summation, actually - those first four albums are very much their own thing and individually distinct and Ki follows that trend. Not sure I'd ever put Physicist in my top Devin albums though, although it's not bad (I'd love to hear more tracks from it re-recorded like 'Kingdom', particularly 'Material' which is a gem).

I would definitely put Punky Bruster in my top Dev albums. I adore that more than I probably should. I'm absolutely gutted I didn't go to the By A Thread / Deconstruction show, as he played songs from it for the encore and no one seemed to get it. At least I got to see Ki and Addicted though - that Ki gig ranks with one of the best I've been to. It was pretty moving.

Well the Pledge drive is up and he's at 69% of target after 2 hours! I think that it's going to go well   

Got me a signed vinyl LP  

http://www.pledgemusic.com/projects/casualties-of-cool

I also got a download of the song Forgive Me which is a great song to relax to. I think I'm going to really like this one.

Pretty ridiculous it's already doing so well! Everything's going pretty quickly, just pledged for the 2CD and the USB collection. Should be good!

Smindas wrote:

Pretty ridiculous it's already doing so well! Everything's going pretty quickly, just pledged for the 2CD and the USB collection. Should be good!

Yeah, it could be that Devin set his sights a little too low as he's now at 120% of target after 5 hours with 61 days of pledging still to go.