Amid The Old Wounds
Photo Cred 📷 : @francis_bebo
Today at Not Just A Phase we’re doing a spotlight review on a very special artist. Daniel Becker is a man who has worn many musical hats in his career, from his previous projects “Wishes On A Plane” in 2002-2009 to “Duct Hearts” in ‘09 - 2018, Daniel is now currently doing a singer / songwriter solo project in “Amid The Old Wounds.” The most glaring influences to his writing for this project are Dashboard Confessional & William Fitzsimmons. Yes, we are going on an emotional journey with this body of work today, so prepare to be shown, hear, and feel a lot more than you may have expected to.
Side effects of listening to Daniel Becker’s work may include: thoughts of sorrow, yearning for the past and versions of your former self, general confusion regarding your purpose in life, feelings of heartbreak and dread, general anxieties as well as overwhelming feelings of love and loss, defeat, triumph & strong urges to emotionally look inward, and overall self reflection. Side effects may also include but aren’t limited to: strong urges to call your ex or therapist and potentially even dust off your old acoustic guitar. Daniel Becker, “Amid The Old Wounds,” and all of his musical endeavors are not liable for any choices you may make while experiencing any of these potential side affects.
After signing a few waivers we were allowed to ask Daniel some questions about his latest release which is a collective of singles, older songs and b-sides called Almost Lost. We discuss his inspirations amongst other things while including the writing and recording process and the beauty within the imperfections.
WHAT WENT INTO THE WRITING PROCESS FOR ALMOST LOST?
“Well It varies a lot from song to song, especially since Almost Lost is a record that compiles a bunch of singles, with older songs that were ‘leftovers’ from bands over the years, some were among the first songs I wrote. Anyway, usually I write down whatever lyrics come my way, what's on my mind, what keeps me awake at night... Sometimes it's just a sentence, sometimes it's an entire page. In parallel, I play chords on my guitar and try to come up with things that go beyond standard chords.
Sometimes these two writing processes just magically latch onto each other and a song forms pretty quickly and I only have to explicitly work on the last sentences, and sometimes a guitar part or some lyrics lie around for ages because I don't know what to do with them. Other than that there is no set process, I usually like to give creativity enough room to unfold but not force it, except for the final sentence or something that can be a bit of more effort to get right.”
DO YOU HAVE ANY SPECIFIC ROUTINE OR STANDARDS IN REGARDS TO YOUR RECORDING PROCESS?
“I usually demo songs on my phone, but for some I don't. Most of the time I have a certain record I want to record for then pick the songs and practice them until I am confident with my playing. I mostly play the guitar to write and record, so I need to practice more than you'd think. I record at home but it takes a bit to setup and get into recording mode so like others, who take leave from work and book studio time, I record over a few consecutive days and take those days off, or record whenever there's not much work to do anyway.
During the practicing process I decide on a certain speed, or if the song can't be done in a single BPM I program that, and partly practice to metronome. I have recorded songs live without click, but only if that's the only option. You might think recording a guy playing his acoustic guitar and singing is a quick record, but I record with very natural room sounds and ambience mics, so every small noise will be very audible in the mix, compared to for example when recording just with a guitar pickup. So it takes a lot longer than one might think.
I've been diagnosed with house dust allergies which has been affecting my quality and stamina at singing, so I mostly record when my voice is in good shape, which has become increasingly rarer within the last years, but I am treating the allergies and am also consulting a speech therapist at the moment so I hope in the future recording vocals may become easier.”
HOW WAS ALMOST LOST MIXED AND MASTERED?
“I have been working with a friend of mine named Franz who is running a small studio called Koenichsound. He has mixed and mastered all songs from Almost Lost as well as the recent split with Mt. Oriander. However we have recently started a collaborative project called 'their something borrowed, glory' he is busy with adding his bells and whistles to my basic tracks, and life in general, so I have been working with Role at Die Tonmeisterei on some other single tracks and the future will be a mix of the two I guess. Both have different approaches to mixing and I learn different things about my recording process from working with both people.”
“I THINK MOST OF MY SONGS ARE MOTIVATED BY THE MENTAL OR EMOTIONAL STAGE I AM IN AT THE TIME AND IN A WAY THEY SERVE AS THERAPHY. THEY DEAL WITH BREAKUPS AND GENERAL HEARTBREAK OR LONLINESS, BUT ALSO WITH A REVELATION OR MAKING PEACE WITH A PAST LET-DOWN OR TRAUMA. I THINK AS ANY PYSCHOLOGICAL THERAPY THEY SERVE AS A MEANS TO UNDERSTAND MYSELF BETTER EVERY DAY.”
DANIEL BECKER - @AMIDTHEOLDWOUNDS
SO WHAT’S NEXT FOR YOU AND YOUR MUSIC IN 2025?
“Well, I have a couple of songs I am recording for an EP and a bunch of smaller releases here and there. The biggest milestone would be a more consistent and reliable voice to be able to sing and record at a faster pace and better quality. I embrace imperfection as mentioned, but also have a certain ambition towards the quality of my performance and recording. That's probably nothing you can count but is really important to me.
Other than that this project is really a means and document of growth as a person, and a musician and singer, so my journey here really is the goal. I would like to see more people listen to my music, and maybe my music might help them through difficult times like other people's music has done for me. It's not like I wouldn't enjoy if this turned out making a part time income so I'd have more time to make music, but the motivation really is to follow my inspiration and be creative.”
ANY FINAL THOUGHTS TO LEAVE WITH THE READERS?
“I'm not sure if this has come to everyone's attention but I wanted to emphasize what Spotify's changes in demonetization means to small artists, and subculture in general. Basically in addition to the weakest payout per stream compared to any other streaming service, Spotify has now stopped paying out for songs that perform less than 1000 streams per month. Their reasoning sounds sensible, saying that small payouts don't reach the artist anyway due to high minimum payouts from the distributor, so a lot of those micro-payouts just stay with the distributor and never get paid out eventually. This might be true for an artist with only a few songs, but let's take a small DIY label or artist with maybe 5 albums, 10 songs each that plays 500 streams per song each month.
That's a significant amount of 2500 plays per month, 30,000 plays per year, equals $70-100 that DON'T GET PAID out to the artist that earns and needs it and that goes to the Drakes and Taylor Swifts (I love TS, by the way,, just saying, she makes enough already). So where does this lead? Even more payouts to the big artists, even less support for small and developing artists. The initial idea of streaming was more democracy, less gatekeeping by labels, radio stations and distributors. So I can only encourage artists and listeners to find better ways to fund subculture and artists directly, over big corporations.”
In far less politically correct words I too would like to say that Spotify is a fuckin cancer to the DIY scene and they literally do not pay their creators for their content either. So let’s say you have a pretty successful podcast you’ve run for four years on their platform and let’s say you were even in their top ten percent most listened to podcasts in 2022 (facts), it don’t mean a damn thing to them, you don’t get a dime. We all need to support each other with whatever funds we have to keep art and artists alive, and with that being said…
Attached to this article below is a beautiful song chosen by Daniel off of the Almost Lost collection. I strongly encourage you to listen to it and if the song doesn’t move you then you might be a robot. All of his previous bands and previous releases contain pieces and memories of Daniel’s life journey that are deeply personal and also universally relatable at the same time, that’s something truly powerful and hard to convey with music.
The Almost Lost CD & cassettes are being released on Daniels own label Time As A Color, as well as Slow Down Records in Norway and Rufen Publishings in Japan. The split with Mt. Oriander has the same labels mentioned above releasing the split and is also being released by Sonic Rendezvous in the UK, Shove Records in Italy, Civic Duty in Australia, and in the states we have Friendly Otter, New Knee Records and Count Your Lucky Stars with copies so grab one while ya still can!
