Film maker, Raquel Salazar, sat down with me to talk about the purpose of music, the reasons why I create it, and what I’m up to with the new album. Thanks to Mine All Mine Records for introducing us!

As those of you who occasionally drop in on my website know, I’ve been working on my new record for the better part of 3 years. It’s been the hardest thing I’ve ever done, and working on this record has changed the fabric of who I am, and what I’m setting out to achieve with my music. For reasons too numerous and elusive to explain, I’ve decided not to release my new record as The Enright House – in fact, I’m pretty sure The Enright House has run it’s course for me.

That does not mean, of course, that I’m not going to keep making music – very, very much the contrary! It just means that from now on I will be releasing it under a new name. I’ve already picked this new name, as well, and, when I’m ready, I’ll share it with you and let you hear what I’ve been up to for all these years of quietude.

In the meantime, I would like to thank all of you for your loyalty, your generosity, and your kindness. I hope, when the time finally comes, that you can walk this new path with me. Until then, I will return to being a hermit. I’m not quite ready yet… but I will be. See you all then.

Much love,
Mark

For more info on this film trilogy visit the film maker’s blog.

A few months ago Andrew Dubber asked me to curate a post for his blog “Curated by Interesting People”. Aside from being flattered, I just really, really enjoyed putting together this post. Check out the project here.

mc 2 (enright house cover) by sarahann

So, last year Richard Allen, a reviewer for The Silent Ballet, basically ripped me a new one for “marring” an otherwise potentially blissful song called “Distance” with relentless chatter, writing this:

“As my secretary told me, ‘the music’s nice – very relaxing.’ But the people just won’t shut up. (…) nine minutes of stumbling, echoed conversation between a man and a woman who whine, accuse and try to come to some understanding about their relationship. And in this piece, the music doesn’t even start for two minutes!”

Ha. Well. So yeah. I always thought Richard was a tad harsh, but – in all fairness – I took his point. There’s artistic, and then there’s pretentious, and I might have straddled that line a bit too much :).

Here it is then… a brand new mix of “Distance” without all the conversation (or vocoder). Trimmed, edited, re-mixed, and re-mastered. Simplified.

Really hope you enjoy it (and end up sharing it!).

Download it for free here: www.tweetforatrack.com/theenrighthouse

If you want to get your hands on the original version, you can download the whole Split EP called “Together” (featuring The Enright House and Pushmi-Pullyu) for free here.

A few weeks ago I got an email from a guy called James, who wrote to tell me about a remix of Darkwave he had created. His email came totally out of the blue, as it has been ages since I posted the Darkwave remix pack (which is still up, btw). I was pretty excited honestly. Kind of like finding a $20 dollar bill in some old pair of jeans that I’ve completely forgotten about.

Anyhow, not only was I stoked that someone had remixed Darkwave, but the remix itself is super creative and very beautiful. James rearranged the song, added vocals of his own, wrote a few new lines of lyrics (I love that he did this!!!), and more. He really made it his own, so I asked James to tell me a bit more about his remix:

“I used to listen to the song a lot, and got the remix pack when it came out, but never got around to do doing anything with it. Recently I’ve become obsessed with the idea of remixes, and making music production less uni-directional. I associate Darkwave with a particular time in my life which I havent really made peace with yet, and reworking this song in my own voice seemed to be a way of achieving some closure.”

James plans to put out a release with more covers and remixes this year, so if enjoy this one, make sure you check out more of his music, as well as his label/blog Papaiti Records.

Download the remix right here, and feel free to share this remix in any way you want.

I scared the living daylights out of my partner, Mary, the other day. Two weeks ago I noticed that my remix was #9 on the RDU charts, and thought I would check to see how it was doing this week.

Hand to the heart, I was certain it would be out of the charts. You know… a dip in / dip out kind of situation.

I was so shocked when I saw it was #1 this week, I literally shrieked!

Thanks to all you cats over at RDU who have been spinning the remix. And sorry, Mary, for making loud, scary noises. XoXo!