After spending the summer touring western Canada, Texture & Light returns to Powell River for the release of its new album, Inner Space Odyssey, Friday, October 14, at Red Lion Pub. It marks the first time Trevor Refix Mervyn and Lyell Woloschuk have fully collaborated. Mervyn answered the following questions.
How are you feeling about the album?
I’m so excited to share it with people. It was torturous to have it sitting in boxes. We’ve been working on this for three years and it’s going to be so great to have it out. People can talk about it, share it, listen to it and talk to us about it.
What’s new with this second album?
It’s not so much a new direction as it is an evolution of the sound. Thanks to the involvement of my bandmate, Lyell Woloschuk, everything is a lot more technically progressive. This album has come out of two years of playing shows, the collaboration with Lyell, and a lot more technical know-how and ability.
Do you hope for the same success as your first album, The Hard Problem of Consciousness?
I am trying really hard not to have expectations about this album. Attaching my feeling of validation or self-esteem to what other people think is a dangerous game.
How different is the album to live performance?
For us to play a song live we almost have to rewrite the whole song because we don’t bring our studio out with us. We bring instruments, synthesizers and drum machines. By the time a song gets in the live set there’s been hundreds of hours of work. Then it’s alive and it just goes.
Where do you go next?
There’s a lot of stuff going on right now. It’s hard to keep it straight sometimes. I always feel my music is a year or two behind where my brain is at. I’m already thinking of the next album and new songs and next ideas.
For more information, go to textureandlight.ca.
