artist Clint Hutzulak

I first thought of making a soundtrack album to accompany my novel, The Beautiful Dead End (Anvil Press, 2002; Editions Alto, 2005), when I heard Barry Adamson’s Moss Side Story in the early 1990s. Adamson envisioned his concept album, complete with snatches of dialogue, radio broadcasts and sound effects, as the soundtrack for an imaginary film. Around that same time, I began to collect soundtrack albums. The soundtracks (often for movies I hadn’t yet seen) created a near-perfect cinematic headspace for writing. I could feel the music seeping into, infecting, my writing. What I really wanted, however, was something customized for the novel I was working on. I invited a few composers and musicians to submit material that would suit the tone of the project, and organized several new recording sessions with Victoria-based musicians. With a scene-by-scene synopsis of the narrative to improvise from, they improvised music that captured the mood of the scenes I wanted to “score.” Some of the material was mixed by Giorgio Magnanensi, some by Tolan McNeil, and some mixed or remixed by Lee Hutzulak. In the end, 23 musicians from Italy, Quebec, Vancouver and Victoria contributed solo or ensemble pieces to the instrumental music on this disc. The pieces range from dark electro-acoustic chamber music to spacey country ambience. Almost everything was improvised live in single takes with no overdubs — a testament to the creativity and open ears of these musicians.

Lee Hutzulak
Thomas Shields
Matt Skillings
Leigh Grisewood
Lily Fawn