Pieces is a collection of music written between 2012 – 2014 in staggered phases, compiled and released in August 2014. It is available as a free album via Bandcamp, and is also available via iTunes, Amazon, Spotify, Google Play, and Magnatune (among others).
“Pieces” is a compilation of previously unreleased works by UK-based musician & producer Adam Fielding, written & recorded during 2012-2014, and released in August 2014.
The main free release of “Pieces” is available to all to download in the format of their choice.
Following directly on from both “Icarus” and his work for TV, film, and commercial use, “Pieces” is an exploration of Fielding’s eclectic range of influences and inspirations. While maintaining a consistent aesthetic throughout, “Pieces” retains an incredibly earnest and varied impression of Fielding’s writing & production styles, resulting in a collection of music that is as honest as it is diverse.
From the euphoric, post-rock tinged opening of “A Call To Action” through to the moody, introspective electronic workings of “Sleepless”, organic instrumentation combines with precise electronics to offer listeners a memorable melodic experience combined with lush atmospheric production on a truly epic scale.
Pieces was written between 2012 – 2014, and originally started life as a continuation of a project I started back in late 2009 of writing a “sketch”-a-day to really push some ideas out while working on Lightfields. I had read of artists using a similar technique to get over a creative block, and figured I’d try it during a damp spell in the period while I was creating Lightfields. That idea worked out incredibly well, and a lot of the tracks I wrote (with no expectations whatsoever) ended up being sent to a lot of agencies and have since been placed in TV shows & advertising.
About a year after writing And All Is As It Should Be, I decided to try something similar – just writing songs for the hell of it, and seeing what popped out. I already had one idea set in stone following a sleepless night in August (no prizes for guessing which track that is), and figured I’d try writing more tracks like that. Free of expectation, just writing because I wanted to write. No over-arching themes, no grand concepts, just a bunch of tunes. Perhaps I could use them as production tunes.
In October 2012, I wrote sixteen songs with this in mind. Two of those ended up being used in an artist feature video for Propellerhead Software. Even though I was incredibly happy with these songs, I wanted to add to this collection. More than anything, I wanted to keep writing music in this manner – writing because I wanted to write, and had something to express without any expectation or pressure from external forces. It reminded me of why I started writing music in the first place. Don’t get me wrong – I love working on big projects, but I also love writing music for me. Nobody else, just me.
(if you’d like to hear some of the tracks I originally wrote for Pieces that didn’t make the mark, check this out)
This trend continued in fits & starts. I wrote a few more tracks late in 2013 that I thought would work for my next album, and I wrote some more tracks in 2014 that I just wanted to write. Each burst reflected where I was at the time: in 2013 I wanted to write something deeply personal and unfettered by production expectations, and in 2014 I wanted to write something using the techniques I had learned while working and performing with Civil Protection on our first album.
But the strangest thing happened. These disparate tracks sounded like they belonged together. In early 2014, after working on the newest songs for Pieces, I decided I wanted to release all of it. Not only that, I wanted to release them independently, and try something new. This gave birth to the idea of releasing multiple versions of Pieces – the extended version, and the audiophile master.
I wanted to release Pieces for free. I’m in an incredibly fortunate place now where I can work on my own music when I please, and work on other audio-related ventures to support myself. Pieces is, right next to And All Is As It Should Be, my most honest album to date. I had no expectations for these tracks, I wrote them because I wanted to express something. The fact that some of the original tracks were picked up for production use is ancillary – these are songs I wrote for myself. Much like my other independent releases, this is a time capsule. I can listen to Pieces and remember exactly where I was and what I was going through when I wrote these tracks.
But I wanted to give listeners something for supporting me. I was so happy with how And All Is As It Should Be turned out that I wanted to re-visit that theme. I also wanted to work on something I came across in late 2013 – an Audiophile Master. Something for people with dedicated listening environments who aren’t afraid to turn the volume up. I still maintain that the original version of the album was released exactly as I intended, but I’m incredibly happy with how the Audiophile Master turned out as well. It’s something I would enjoy as a listener, and that’s why I did it.
As a return to independent full-length releases, I couldn’t be happier with how it’s turned out.
Pieces was officially released in August 2014.