Chris Carlier | Short Songs

A Deep Dive Into the Carlier Archives

A person sipping a drink. A music workstation is behind him

Hi all,

Hope your winter is treating you well. It's been so mild for so long here in the Candian prairies, and now we've gotten a rather large dump of snow.

Lately, I've been working a bit on what I like to think of as my Digital Legacy Plan. The idea is basically that people should know what to do with my digital life and possessions if I should drop dead. While I plan on sticking around for a good, long while, I like the idea of knowing that things are handled and easy to deal with for anyone non-techy who should have to deal with it.

Anyway, in cleaning up and consolidating my digital files, I have come across so many gems from my past and thought I'd share a few of them with you here.

Please enjoy this weird hodgepodge of files...

Synthesizers on a table

Synth Mess 2013.jpg - I can't tell for sure, but I think this pic is from when I joined a bunch of other nerds for National Drone Day. Around 5 of us brought various synthesizers and other audio generators and basically just messed around and made non-musical noise for like 3+ hours. It was a fun and odd experience. If I recall correctly, my now-wife was the only audience member. She put in earplugs and fell asleep at the back of the room. 😆

A concert promo photo collage for Cured By Fire

CBF Arts Fest 2015.jpg - Promo poster for a duo I was in with my friend Jen called Cured By Fire. I think it was our only gig. Fun stuff though. It was an electro-acoustic thing with Jen singing lead and me providing guitar and synth and beat production. Check out mankiller for a clip of us coming up with a fun new tune back in the day.

2019 Super Secret Summer Sampler cover art by Electricloud Recordings

supersecret.jpg - In 2019, I put together a little sampler of artists on the Electricloud Recordings label with the intention of giving out little free download cards. I printed 200 cards or something and handed them out in multiple cities, at events, posted them to peg boards, hid them in businesses, etc. Because it was summertime, I wanted a summer scene, but I thought this was a little to on-the-nose, and didn't really represent what people would hear on the sampler, so for the final version, I inverted the colours, giving the image a dismal, dystopian twist. Check out the attachment Download Cards.pdf to see the cards I was handing out and leaving everywhere.

An electric guitar, amp, and a banjo

DSC01301.JPG - Guitar and banjo in the music room.

A bass clarinet and tenor saxophone in a stand

DSC01304.JPG - Bass clarinet and tenor sax in the music room.

A person wearing headphones. A synthesiser can be seen in the background.

wb1.jpg - This was a promotional photo I was using for a while, circa 2013. For a while, I tried on a new persona at live shows: Whisky Bear. It was my experimental synth/sax solo show. Lots of fun live, but I put it on the back burner to focus on other stuff. There are still some tracks from this project up on Soundcloud for now. Eventually, I intend to host this myself somewhere - likely shortsongs.ca.

A person playing saxophone and synthesizers on stage

20140920_160518.jpg - Performing as Whisky Bear, on saxophone and three little synthesizers.

That's about all for now. Still lots of neat stuff in the archives that makes me smile. I'll do another post like this sometime in the future.

Anyway, back to work.

Be well out there,

Chris