Forever filling the void of atmospheric space, Every Nothing is the latest release by Tides Of Man. The instrumentally gorgeous ambiance rides through clever instrumentation and vivid landscapes of music. Within bursting orchestrations of colorful progressions, this record is a sonic experience meant to take people on a journey through the depths of the earth. Take a listen to Every Nothing below, and read an in depth track by track form Tides Of Man.
STATIC HYMN
This is one of the first ideas we started writing after we released Young And Courageous. It started as a simple guitar demo of only the intro chords. The song really came to life when alan wrote the bass line and we added the middle section where the melodic lead guitar line comes in. Then the end is one of my favorite parts of the record. It’s not super obvious cause it’s not high up in the mix, but there is totally a stranger things inspired synth line in there.
MERCURY FIELDS
This song is one of my favorites on the album. One thing about writing post rock these days is it’s tough to avoid the tropes. Instead of just doing another soft intro to build up crescendo, we wanted to write some more groove-based songs. This song is all about the vibes and rhythms. I love the drums, and it also has my favorite guitar work on the record.
NEW FUTURES
This song is another favorite. I’m super proud of the guitar tones we got in the studio. Funny story, this song started out as a demo that Spencer made all by himself. It originally sounded so different, but we stripped away a bunch of tracks and rebuilt the song based on the synth and the stick taps.
FAR OFF
This little track has the coolest production on the record. First, Spencer played the piano on a grand piano at cleartrack studios. We cranked up the preamps to get a driven, compressed tone. Then we set up a Rhodes piano and put it through Spencer’s pedalboard to get all the ambience. We recorded that to tape, and as we were tracking, our producer Spencer Bradham was manipulating the tape, causing it to have the little pitch warbles that you hear. We also tossed in some field recordings of people in a park. It turned out very cool.
OLD 88
We’ve never done a song with this vibe before. We almost didn’t put it on the record cause we weren’t sure if it fit with the other songs, but I’m so glad we decided to include it. The end hits hard, and we got to have a lot of fun writing and recording the guitars on this one.
WAXWING
This song started out as a collection of guitar riffs. I brought them to Spencer and he played with the chord shapes I was using and wrote the chill intro section, and suggested the ambient bridge. I love how this song progresses from beginning to end, and how a lot of the melodies pop in multiple times throughout the song, but in different ways.
KEEP TELLING YOURSELF
This was a sad sounding little interlude that Alan and Spencer wrote together years ago. It sounds so remorseful and sincere. And I love the way it transitions into the next song.
EVERYTHING IS FINE, EVERYONE IS HAPPY
The heaviest song Tides Of Man has ever written. It started off as a song based around Alan’s heavy bass chords. We originally had a different, kinda blues rock vibe going in the section that is now clean with Rhodes piano. I’m glad we changed it cause it provides a nice contrast from the otherwise constant barrage of riffs.
DEATH IS NO DREAD ENEMY
This song puts me in a mood. I love the album version. And this one is Spencer’s baby. This song also kinda came about in multiple stages from multiple song ideas. The first half of the song you hear now was written in a different key and was faster paced. Spencer denied it out years ago. Then we came up with another song, and realized if we changed the key of his idea, we could put them together to form a complete song. We ended up scrapping the second half, and writing what you hear now. Also, the story of the title is super interesting. Josh’s dad had a heart attack a year or two ago and was medically dead until first responders were able to resuscitate him. The name of this song comes from his description of what he experienced.
OUTSIDE OURSELVES
We love playing songs in 7. It has such a cool, snappy feel to it. This song is also super cool cause it was written around the piano chords. This was the last song we finished on the album, and we booked an extra day just to give the guitars attention, which ended up making the song. We added some of the really pretty clean leads in the beginning and it took the song up a level.
MOSAIC
Josh, our drummer, ripped this song up. I absolutely love the drums on this track. This song also originated from a very old demo, actually I think it’s one we might have had from way back when we were writing young and courageous. It morphed into something completely different but very cool.
INFINITE CEILING
Without a doubt, the most emotional song for me. I’ve always said it feels like you’re looking back on fond memories with a sense of sadness and loss that things have changed. It feels like moving on. I was all about making this the album closer cause it just feels so perfect. It’s a super simple but powerful track and nothing else hits me as hard as this one does.
