A Promise To Keep

Prog rock song inpired by The Song of Ice and Fire books and tv series.

Rise Up

Prog rock song inspired by the Foundation book series by Isaac Asimov.

Galactic Dawn

A song about The Elders Scrolls V: Skyrim.

Lost in Skyrim

A song inspired by "The Songs of Distant Earth" novel by Arthur C. Clarke.

The Song of Distant Earth

Song inspired by Childhood's End novel by Arthur C. Clarke.

Cosmic Ballet

Prog rock song about peace on the 21st century.

A Global Chorus

The Perfect Uniformity of Improvisation

Closing song for the "Bytes of Peace" album.

Coda

In 2018, I did a SoundCloud collaboration with @clive-hawkins after one of his tracks inspired me to write lyrics over his haunting instrumental 'After the Bomb'.

Clive had posted the line "let us not forget the consequences............of unleashing weapons of mass destruction!", and that comment, coupled with listening to his moody track, had me writing the complete lyrics inspired by his music in about 1.5 hours.

In 2025, I am currently working with accomplished keyboard player and Prog Rock enthusiast @Dee-Zee (Dave Zeitlin), to create an Ethno-Prog album 'Beyond the Veiled Horizon'. 

https://soundcloud.com/mrbouzouki/sets/beyond-the-veiled-horizon-series

So when I recently re-heard the old collaboration I wondered if Dave's keyboard wizardry could add a whole new dimension to the lyrics. The message in the lyrics has perhaps has even more urgency in 2025. 

The Doomsday Clock currently stands at 89 seconds to midnight. 
https://thebulletin.org/doomsday-clock/2025-statement/

Using Clive's harmonic rhythm that inspired the melody, that inspired the lyrics, I basically gave Dave a blank slate to see what he could come up with as parts. As usual he delivered some amazing ideas and playing and this left me re-assembling this Redux version of the collaboration. Once again, I made use of the Alto vocal talents of 'Mrs Bouzouki' in a vocal harmony section and as part of some harmony stacks. Towards the end, the additional female backing lines are from the Soundiron 'Voices of Gaia' collection featuring the vocal talents of Linda Strawberry.

I feel the addition of a church organ really added to the track. As a result I removed a choir part I added in the original collaboration and added some low strings to add some weight to the bottom end in places. Besides piano, Dave also added some synth pads to keep things interesting during what is quite a long track. I hope that people can hear why I enjoy working with Dee Zee. I think he's done a fantastic job with this track.

I decided to keep my original vocal takes from 2018 but I feel the track has benefited from my improved mixing and production techniques. 

I feel that once again this track is a great example of how music can be created using the SoundCloud platform. A collaboration can build on a collaboration to create something bigger than the sum of the parts. Thanks @clive-hawkins for being the catalyst for this and @dee-zee for your compositional skill and playing. 

As a follow-up to this song you can watch this movie on the Internet Archive, produced in 1969 about the Hiroshima-Nagasaki bombs of 1945. Some of the imagery is not for the faint-hearted.

archive.org/details/hiroshimanagasakiaugust1945
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Lyrics

After The Bomb - P Goodrich 22/01/2018

One World, One Tribe
One Fate, One Life
Two Sides, Too Late
Just What Have We Done

Dead Streets, Dead Lives
Dead Seas, Dark Skies
We've Gone, Too Far
Ohhhh We've Lost It All

(C)
And The People Cried As One
With The Firing Of A Gun
Too Late For Second Thoughts
Too Late For All Of Us

No Race, No Faith,
No News, No Lies
Past Ways, Past Lives
They're Over and Done

Dark Days, Dark Times
Dark Deeds, Dark Minds
No Hope, All Gone
We've Nowhere To Run

C)
And The People Cried As One
With The Firing Of The Gun
Too Late For Second Thoughts
Too Late For All Of Us

(organ instrumental)

No Rest, No Sleep
No Love, Just Hate
Dull Hearts, Dead Minds
The Future It’s Gone

One World, One Tribe
One Fate, One Life
Two Sides, Too Late
Oh What Have We Done

(C)
And The People Cried As One
With The Firing Of The Gun
Too Late For Second Thoughts
Too Late For All Of Us

One World, One Tribe
(Ad Lib)
We’ve Nowhere To Run
(Final Whispered) After The Bomb ... After The Bomb

After The Bomb - Redux 2025 (89 Seconds To Midnight)

A collection of songs, instrumentals and orchestral pieces charting my adventures in home studio recording and production.  All original compositions using voice, acoustic and electric guitar (sometimes using altered tunings), bouzouki, low and high whistles and MIDI instrumentation. 

I'm also using VST instrumentation to create classical compositions and integrating orchestral sounds into my songs and instrumentals.

Links to various instrumental projects and other Social Media links are available below.

The current collaborative YouTube channel with Dee Zee is here:-

https://www.youtube.com/@DeeZeeandMrB

New tracks tagged #Symphonic Prog