Mark Scudder: Alera EP

The Alera EP was my first official solo release of more traditional, non-atmospheric music. It was supposed to be the first single form the upcoming Back Issues album, but I ran into some snags on the full album and it did not follow on the heels of Alera as expected.

The title track has been around in one form or another since 2003, when I wrote it about an encounter with someone who considered herself an "ugly duckling" who thought she had made the transition to the beautiful swan, and instead used her newfound power to hurt people. I had recently become a fan of Sigur Rós which is what inspired the falsetto bridge, but was built around a sort of Days-of-the-New riff that I couldn't get out of my head one day at work. I don't even listen to Days of the New.

"Alera" broods for the verse sections, and builds to a fever pitch at the end. Someone else actually suggested the creepy, violent ending, where it "blows up," and I think it fits - it speaks to me because I feel that our tolerance for bullshit is being constantly tested, and the desire to blow up at it is always present. But in real life, it's rarely acceptable to do so. In music, I find it works very well as a device.

Backing "Alera" is "Gone," a song from 1994 that languished for years because of a few lyrics I didn't like and could not satisfactorally replace. When it came time to pick tracks for Back Issues, I liked the original arrangement that I recorded in 2003 so much that only the vocal track is new.

Because of the loss of the tracks for my album The Solution is the Problem, I planned to release the things I had left over as bonus tracks on singles from Back Issues. It starts here on Alera. Instrumental and almost-complete demos of two of the heaviest songs from the project, "Hannebrink" and "Idea 9" are bonus tracks here, along with the original 2003 demo of Alera, right after the suggested heavy ending was recorded.

Back Issues will be done when it is done, and will be comprised of songs that I have written over the years that never got the attention or the proper release they deserved.