Portrait Of The Artist Formerly Known As A Young Man (Jinxes & Juvenilia)

MKCD012 2011CE

...or play individual mp3s from the track list on the right.

Celebrating 10 Years of Mirrorkill!

A decade ago, in 2001, Mirrorkill officially released its first album, Shaming Of The True. A couple of years later, in 2003, came Natural Freak. Both albums were recorded at Lancaster Musicians' Co-Op, & engineered & mixed by the mighty Ian Dicken. But although they certainly sounded like professional recordings, they didn't sound like recordings of a particularly professional group. I was still finding my feet, & still using the ancient drum machine Charlemagne, which had served me so well during the life of my previous band Agenda.

Whilst I was happy enough with the results at the time, I find them very difficult to listen to now. They sound naive & awkward. I'd never been a frontman before; I was still figuring out how to sing properly; & certainly in the case of the Shaming Of The True, I was just coming out of an episode of clinical depression, so I was rather all over the place. In the years since then I've learned to record, mix & produce at home on my laptop, & I remain happy with The 19 Sounds & Scan Happen. But also, after Scan Happen, I started to get interested in rehearsing acoustically, & the production of (Batteries Not Invented) cemented this as the new direction for the band.

& a lot of those songs from the first two albums survived - we carried on playing them acoustically, at gigs, & they continue to be powerful & popular songs. Hence this project, to re-record the best of this material in the new idiom, & give it a home on the internet.