Its so long because it was originally just a jam track, then the vocals worked quite well and the jam gets really good towards the end with some nice interludes. Ill rework this with my band coz this is now about 6 years old!

Velvet Sky

Silentium

Signal Fires... The warning signs when someone is trying to ask for help but cant until its too late. I wrote this thinking about a friend who passed away and thought about how he and his fiance would have maybe spoken to one another, even sometimes the thoughts of the one left living of the one who was lost. I also tie in some of my own feelings and experiences and all these things together create quite an intricate picture. Its really deep on an emotional level for me, but I guess could take on other meanings for different people. We all have our own stories to tell and we each interpret the same thing in different ways so if it means something unique to you that's cool too. Feel free to share your ideas. There are some mistakes on this, its just a rough demo so dont shoot me. I will work a really nice and neat version soon. Enjoy.

Signal Fires

A song I had been working on now and again throughout the last year or two. Not really sat down and finished writing anything in ages so this was nice to put some layers behind after only really ever playing it just vocal and guitar. The words are through someone's eyes, looking back across their life from old age and at how much things have changed since they were young and the imaging of the verses is more of their memories, while the choruses tend to a present day thinking back and maybe giving advice outlook. No discernible meaning as such, just a wee story in part. I actually recorded all of this and mixed it in about 2 hours so forguve any patchy mistakes n stuff. Its just a demo. Enjoy :)

Eyes Of Olde

This was written as my first attempt at a love song, or maybe even trying to be happy I guess as anyone who knows my music up until then would tell you, was all pretty sad or really heavy and loud with no real intimacy or emotional out pouring. So it was a bit weird for me to open those channels in any public sense. Inspired by Bill Withers in an interview when he said that he writes about lots of different people and situations and experiences and amalgamates them into one song. So I thought about lots of different people I have known, friends who have told me things, maybe some movies I have watched and blended it all together to create something that reflected how I wanted to feel juxtaposed to how I was feeling at the time. The song has changed a little and I have added some layers to the guitar and vocal in this demo version, and will use this idea for my next studio session when I record my album professionally. Until then, these demos are free to enjoy :) Peace, love & empathy

Shine Like Gold

This is the fusion of an instrumental piece I wrote called Magnetic Storm but then realized that the syllables in the words mated well with the rhythm and so it became a creative cover version of Tool's song Schism. I had released a previous version about 10 years ago or so with just the main guitar part with capo 2nd in standard tuning, but after recent health issues forced me to stop smoking, drinking and eating meat my vocal has changed dramatically and become a home rehab therapy session for my asthma. I can now sing this at a level I am much more comfortable with and decided to experiment with other instruments and parts. I added in a typical Maynard style vocal endurance test, of holding on a single note for the longest time possible without wavering or faltering and maintaining the note at the same level and pitch throughout the entire breath. This is far harder than it sounds. Anyway I hope you enjoy listening to this classic in a new and totally different light with a fresh perspective.

Tool - Schism (creative cover version)

This was a drop tuned acoustic experiment. I was messing about with some chords and then just decided to try and make up some words. After about half an hour this started to come out of that mess and I recorded it within an hour. I drowned this in reverb to give it a dream like quality and purposefully sing bits up into the notes to give a feeling of a wave rising. The whistling represents the wind. Mostly an impressionistic piece, but after receiving a few good comments decided to include it here.

Silence Of The Seas

An experimental track for which I created my first ever music video for The Corvus Experiment in 2006. There are 2 guitar tracks, 1 guitar dropped an octave as a bass and 1 drum loop. No keys, no computers. Just guitar effects and techniques to create all of the sounds you hear.

Solar Fire

This is a song I wrote for  someone who genuinely changed the way I thought about things, who made me see for the first time what was truly important in life. She turned my life around with her words and I had an instant connection to her as if we had been life long friends. I only knew her for one night but the impact she has had on me is truly immense and when I found out that she had died it gutted me. At that time, she had only just found out she was dying, but she hadn't yet told anyone and didn't tell me, but looking back I now see why she was being like that and what some of those things she told really meant, and also why she wanted to avoid the party inside the house and just sit outside in the twilight and talk, in a kind of outpouring of expression about such profound and deeply thought provoking subjects. I have very rarely come across anyone else who had such an effect on me. An instant best friend, and her words have been a massive inspiration to me, and have influenced many of the biggest and best changes in my life. I might even go as far as to say she saved me from myself. That night marked a clear cut fork in the road of my path thru this world, and I know now that I managed to find my way to the things which are of real importance. The things that I needed from life and not just the things that I wanted. Strange to think how these chance encounters happen at such integral times to us, yet we never see it at the time. It is only with hind sight and knowledge gained that we can look back and realize what these things had meant... Once they are gone, we truly learn to comprehend the regard we hold for the people who mean the most to us.

I felt that I had to write a song about her, about the the things she said, what she taught me in a sense and made me realize about myself and what I was looking for out of life, and the way she had changed my views on life with a wisdom which far exceeded her years. There was nothing sexual between us at all, just a truly perfect moment where I found someone who I can now genuinely call a soul mate, who I will never forget as long as I live. 

This is for Lisa O'Reilly... and her family and friends. xxx

One Night (new version demo)


Recorded by Nick Hodge @ Kelburn Studios

100% live improvisation (made up on the spot) between Will Johnstone of The Corvus Experiment on Guitar, and Wully Smith on Vocals, we were in separate rooms with only headphones to hear each other. None of this was pre written, it just suddenly happened as you can hear it and we were lucky enough to have local legend Nick Hodge on the desk to record it or no one would have ever heard this music except us at the time.

The whole piece is around 15 minutes long and blends various styles together which offers an insight into what one of our latest projects (or at least some of it) will possibly sound like. There are loads of mistakes and rough sections of this, but it was completely made up off the top of our heads after a lengthy recording session we just wanted to unleash our creative flow after all the repetition of a full day's recording which can be seriously monotonous. Despite a severe lack of sleep nick was able to stay awake enough to be on this and only a few seconds at the beginning are missing from the entire jam. Well in Nick mate :-)

This track is was set to Private for a secret preview by a strictly limited audience, it is now Public and yes you may share it anywhere you like as we now have everything in place.

All rights reserved The Corvus Experiment @ MCU Records 2013 
(Inclusive of dedicated rights William Smith & Kelburn Studios 2013)

Wully Smith & Will Johnstone - Improvised Live Acoustic Jam @ Kelburn Studios

I recorded this back in 2006 as a small ode to The Staley. I wanted to create an acoustic version of this song that no one would expect. Its not bad, I can do it better now, so Ill probably rerecord this sometime but for now, its another freebie for everyone on Sound Cloud. Enjoy :-)

(Cover) Them Bones - Alice In Chains by Will Johnstone

Solo music project of multi-instrumentalist musician Will Johnstone.
'Pelagic Symbiosis' Recorded, Mixed & Co-Produced - Nick Hodge @ Kelburn Studios


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