2009 news
Tuesday, 15th December – 2009 news about the EP
This new EP will contain four great new songs, two of which, “Victims of love” and “Time and again” are two alternate radio edit versions from the upcoming double album,“Sounds of silence”. The other two tracks,"Fireflies" and "Cavatina" will only appear on this EP and will not be released on the album. The album is still under construction but in its final stages of release. “Time and again” is a song totally written to give tribute to Noel Cauchi, an artist, friend and colleague of Chris and all the profits of this EP will totally go to the Cauchi family.
“The idea of writing a song to give tribute to a great friend and artist, Noel Cauchi came immediately after his loss. Such event was devastating for lots of people including me and left all of us lost for words. A lot of people helped in various ways and musically being an artist myself, I tried to pull out my feelings by writing this song…CM”
Different Strings is the musical project of Chris Mallia. It started almost a decade ago and had the first release in November 2004, the CD single “Dead man walking” followed by the first full length album “…it’s only the beginning” in February 2007. This one man band had several positive reviews from all over the globe including the Dutch Progressive Rock Page, Progarchives, Ytsejam among others;
“…this guy seems to have something to offer to progressive music, and I think he
deserves a chance to find himself a decent record deal… Dutch Progressive Rock Page”
“…"It's Only the Beginning" delivers most of what I look for when I turn toward Neo-Progressive rock: well-composed, layered, emotional, and atmospheric music. The arrangements are fantastic and deserve the generous amount of presence they receive in the music… Progarchives”
“…the brainchild of musician/songwriter Chris Mallia, his project Different Strings is neo-prog project that stands in line with Carptree and Galleon, being driven by synthesizers and
hook oriented Floydian soundscapes. Chris Mallia is a great musician and writer for that matter, hopefully, It's only the Beginning is the beginning of some more material to come… Ytsejam”
“…it’s like a dinosaur that was dormant for a few years but it’s eager to return roaring as ever with a great release of prog material. A double album is surely some more material to expose and I’m sure that it will be well accepted from fans of this genre…CM”
You can pre-order the EP at the price of €7 by clicking on the buy now button. As described earlier all the profits of this EP will totally go to the Cauchi family.
Saturday, 5th December – 2009 …where have I been?!
Yes, one would ask what happened to me since the last news I gave was in June. Well a lot of things actually but I was too angry, annoyed, sad and lots of other feelings went on my life these past months. One in particular is the sad and tragic death of a great artist and friend of mine, Noel Cauchi, that left me and others lost for words in any way whatsoever.
This tragedy inspired me in writing a new song which I will include in the album and I wanted to dedicate it to him in his honor. The song is called “Time and again”.
Talking about the album a lot of things happened as well. Firstly and most importantly is that the album is no longer a single disc but it became a double album. This is the results of a huge amount of material kept aside and lyrically speaking there was a connection between lots of them to make a 2-disc concept album. The title is still the same “Sounds of silence” but this time it will have 2 discs with other 2 separate titles.
I’m hoping that it won’t take long to finish since I finally found a vocalist and this time the guy is really interested in my work. I’m talking about Errol Cutajar, whom he had a lot of experience in performing live shows with the voices choir.
Finally I wanted to end this session by announcing that in the following months I will release an EP with songs from the following album and others that won’t be on the album. This will be titled “Victims of love” more details will follow in the following days.
Ok that's all for today, hopefully I'll try to keep in touch more often, in the meantime, Cheers!
Tuesday, 23rd June 2009 - some more news
Hey folks how ‘ur doin. It’s been awhile and nothing in particular happened since the last time. I and the other guys didn’t have much time to continue on the new album but hopefully this summer will work hard on it so maybe I’ll say it’s finished!
One thing that I did is giving my website a new look, as you already noticed, what do you think? Is it betta!? Some new links were added like the lessons and stuff… which include a basic idea about the music lessons I give and the videos section, although the latter is still under construction due to video editing and recording Anyway that’s all for today, hope to annoy you more often with better news till than, buy!
Thursday, 14th May 2009 - some news
Hi there everyone, I hope you're allright. Since the last time I posted some news things yet again turned a little resulting in another faded illusion to start this band to give some shows live. Yes I thought I had completed a puzzle but it shattered again when the drummer I mentioned a few weeks ago decided that he's not up to standard of our music. In the meantime I've found a very young talented keyboard player, Joe Axiaq, with lots of interest in prog rock and bands such as Dream Theatre and Porcupine tree which, I guess, are a great source of inspiration for my music. I hope there'll be some chemistry between us and most of all hoping to find another drummer. Drummers are so annoyingly difficult to find in our country.
Lately I've found another review this time is written in Georgian. I couldn't find any source where I can translate it. If there's anyone out there that can read and translate Georgian please be my guest and send it to me so I can put it on the website. here's the link;
http://forum.ge/?f=21&showtopic=33925151&st=510
Regarding the new album I'm trying to finalize a track so I can later on forward them to a local pro studio for mixing and release the first and only single of this album. When things will get close I'll forward you with some news in the meantime thanks agian, BYE!.
Tuesday, 14th April 2009 - More reviews
Hi there. Lately I've found that two more websites added a review on the first album, ...it's only the beginning, one in Portughese and one in French. These are the links to the respective sites in their original languages but in the reviews section I translated the reviews for you to read.
http://museorosenbach.blogspot.com/2009/04/different-strings-2006-its-only.html?showComment=1238953020000
http://www.dragonjazz.com/progdisco/inter.htm
Thanks a lot and see you soon with more news.
Sunday, 12th April 2009 - happy Easter everyone!
...and yet again it's been quite a while since my last visit here with some good or bad news. Last time I greeted you with the new year, this time it's easter, shall I slow down the pace!?! Anyway since the last time great things happened regarding the future of Different Strings. From the second album point of view in early March I went at the Norm rejection's (local alternative rock band) place to record all the distorted and loud guitars excluding the solos, I have to practice them a little before record them right! Thanks to Mike Briguglio, this place will also be Different Strings' rehearsing room since finally I've found a vocalist and a drummer to start rehearsing songs. Yes this is the other good news. Well Laurence Baldacchino ex-fire on drums and Karl Zammit on vocals. I called Karl to sing on my album but things happened so fast that it's worth to give it a try. So now with Trevor Catania on bass, whom in fact is recording the bass parts as well on the second cd, will be another piece of this puzzle.
Some trouble happened as well but I don't wanna annoy you with this shit right! The important thing is that we're on a good vibe now so we're trying to capture the moment. Hopefully I'll give you more news in the near future till then, bye!
Sunday, 11th January 2009 - happy new year!
Well hello everyone. It's 2009 and yet again another year ended with me strugglin to continue my second release that seems to take the eternity to finish. Well it was a difficult year for me from different angles but hopefully a big step will take place early this year. One thing that slowed me was that I ended up 2008 with practically rearranging all the drums from scratch. I'm not using anymore my custom virtual drumkit sf2 but instead I decided to use the release of the vsti drumkit from hell from Toontrack. I was a little sceptic at first because of the wide range of cymbals that I like to use but I managed to fit alot of DHF cymbals that I think fit well where I intended, and beleive me it sounds awesome. The real thing, nothing to do with the old stuff I was using. I'm expecting good reviews guys out there! So what else can I say.
I hope that myself and all of you out there have a great 2009 and hopefully I start very soon recording the remaning guitar tracks and thanks to George Zammit maybe a little work on the front cover as well, until we meet again, bye. Oh by the way...take a look at the pics section.I added some old photos dating back the velvet days.
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