THE LIVES OF LUCY AND LUKAS
Alec Davis
Movement Zero: THE LIVES OF LUCY AND LUKAS was my first solo side-project. I wanted to write some music without having to meticulously plan like I did with The River Versus, without having to practise until my hands bled, and without my brain exploding – this was the result. It’s stylistically different from The River Versus – okay, so it’s very different – and that was largely the point. Moreover, I felt the music suited Lucy and Lukas’ story, so I went with it.
I grew up in a just-outside-of-London-but-could-still-get-there-by-train-in-thirty-minutes town that had a vibrant music scene/culture. In my little subset of that was Team Skate Punk. For me, the inline skates came first and the punk music came later (after torturing my dad with Green Day’s Dookie for months, an older friend of mine handed me Pennywise and Strung Out albums and the obsession began). So much of this scene was run by DIY outfits, recording in dodgy, bootleg studios above corner shops; behind strip joints; or in retired mills – but no matter how bad the recording quality of the records, the passion for the music always cut through. As the noughties approached, the skate punk scene seemed to split into the ska punk and emoooooooo scenes, and I was part of both, listening to Capdown alongside Taking Back Sunday. Again, these early records were trashy and gritty, but felt so powerful to me. I wanted to recreate some semblance of that sound.
For those not familiar with the modern recording process, getting the ‘polished’ sound requires an epic amount of time, energy, and expert know-how which takes decades to get under your music-tech belt. Oh, and a s***-tonne of money. It also relies heavily on people knowing their instrument inside-out and how to create that perfect sound. So, the fact that I wanted to create this trashy, low-quality-sounding record was, admittedly, very easy. I own a mid-range drum kit, TRV’s Jimmy Trippier lent me a bass guitar and preamp, and my dad lent me an excellent electric guitar (which I’ve yet to return) and gave me my brother’s old guitar amp, which I immediately decided to distort using the old school method – crank the gain to the max and nudge up the volume in tiny increments so you don’t blow up the amp, and yourself, in the process. It also rattled like a mother****er (which I covered up on record with conveniently placed shaker tracks). I gathered my ‘band’ and then I was ready to thrash my guitar around and wreck my vocal chords in the name of punk.
I broke down the plot of Lucy and Lukas into sections, jotted down some lyrical and musical ideas for each, and set to writing. It started out with the punk and emo vibes I wanted, but as the story played out (why did I make it so god damn bleak and whiney?! Jeez, Davis…), the musical direction shifted towards the post-hardcore and proggier (is this a word?) side of things. When I was writing Puzzle, I felt like I was writing a B-side for Thrice’s Artist in the Ambulance 2003 album. I was okay with that.
Once the album was written, I recorded the drums at the nightclub Satan’s Hollow in Manchester where I worked (many thanks to Aaron Stanton for helping me out with that), and I recorded the rest of it at home, likely driving my girlfriend and neighbours absolutely mental. I mean, some of the harmonies I sang were so high, and took me like twenty tries to get right…I just….apologies, everyone. I then mixed and mastered it to the best of my ability and let it sit. For years. Listening to it back now, it sounds exactly how it was made – in a bedroom with a shitty guitar amp cranked to the max. I could not be happier with it.
I hope you enjoyed this hour-or-so-long instalment of self-indulgent lunacy.
Alec Davis. December 2020
Deathkat Media 