Circus Divine
Some notes, thoughts & reminiscences
Dave S:
This and Twilight were the first two tracks written, very much influenced by films I was watching at the time (as were most of the tracks).
Martin:
After, what must be, over 15 years, I recently listened to the Nefarious-demo back-to-back with the Bleak Insight CD. Although the sound of the snare and kick are weaker on Nefarious, the overall sound is much better on the demo. The vocals, including the backing vox, sit in the correct place. Anyway, Circus Divine. Circus Divine was, and still is, my favourite track. I consider it to be the definitive Sevenchurch song. The ideology is revealed. A unique multi-faceted sound. It certainly creates an atmosphere, which, I'm reliably informed, is always important when music making. All the various sections fit together really well. Great dynamics -- light 'n' shade. Significantly, there are also a reasonable variety of vocal patterns and syllable counts at play. I'm not the greatest fan of vocal sections that follow the lead guitar, but the ones featured here are okay, eg. at 4:46: "Do, not, fear! I, am, here!". Annoyingly, in places a faux Noo Yawk accent creeps-in: "Yoo tawwhkin’ ta may?". My favourite moment on this track happens at 6:29 -- four bars of very gloomy guitar playing. Also, the slow, sombre intro bars, with loads of space between the snare hits, deserves a mention -- setting things up nicely.
Ollie:
I think this was the second song we wrote as Sevenchurch but it was the first to be recorded in a studio. It actually started life being called Chimera but I seem to remember some other band releasing a song called Chimera prompting us to change the title.
We went into Fleece Studio (where we also later recorded Nefarious) and recorded Chimera as a 4-piece with me doing lead vocals. It was our first experience in a proper recording studio and we were lucky to have Tim Turan behind the desk. It was fantastic experience and the results were pretty good for a first attempt although it helped us realise that a proper lead vocalist might be a good idea!
The song opened many doors for us and the slow drums and feedback at the start were a real statement of intent.