This track depicts the time the main character spends in the chamber of eternal sleep that he entered in Inner Sanctum. The keyboard parts for this ambient track were entirely improvised, and I liked my demo version so much that I ended up using it on the final record instead of trying to recreate it. This song features reprises of the “choruses” of Inner Sanctum and Arrival in a Distant Land. It includes field recordings from an inner city Philadelphia first grade classroom with a substitute teacher, a high school graduation, the river before a storm, and more, in addition to many processed public domain speeches.
Because it was a home recording, there is no footage of the sessions for this song. Instead, I’ve created a new dark ambient track based around piano improvisation. This off-the-cuff improvisation was performed on an out of tune practice room piano at the University of Pittsburgh into a laptop microphone, but I ended up liking how it came out (sound quality aside), so I turned it into a lo-fi ambient track. Check out the track below:
Gabriel’s Notes: This song is somewhat of a tribute to the ’90s space rock band Failure. For the fast first half, I had a b-side called ‘Mange’ in mind, in which the bass and guitar play different sets of fifths which are dissonant against each other. For the slow second half, their song ‘Small Crimes’ was my main source. However, I looked to other sources for the vocals and solos and included some quite complex rhythms (the ‘chorus’ features a bar of 7/8 on every third bar, which means it falls on a different chord of the 4-chord progression on each repeat). The first part of the song features an 11-part vocal choir (with doublings), including glissandos similar to those included in Bang on a Can’s large collaborative work ‘Shelter’. For contrast, the second half includes a single, very intimate lead vocal for most of its duration, perhaps inspired by Chino Moreno of Deftones. The linear tempo decrease interlude features more Mingus-style simultaneous soloing, and the song ends in free jazz controlled chaos. I overdubbed a piano solo on this section, but evidently didn’t film it, so I’ve created new footage for the picture-in-picture sections of this video (including the solos in the first half, which weren’t piano on the album). The ending noise was also overdubbed – I wanted to bang on the piano with both hands to make the largest possible amount of noise instead of only using my right hand. There were also some subtle overdubs during the slow section, adding doublings at higher octaves and some improvisation.
The opening fast section of this song requires quite a bit of stamina to pull off, and as a result I started out tracking it in small chunks, so you’ll see quite a few edits towards the beginning. As I warmed up to it, I ended up doing most of it in a single take, which generated quite a bit of lactic acid in my arms. You can see my discomfort in my facial expressions in the second chorus!
Travis’s Notes: Next in the ‘Interior City’ series is “Inner Sanctum”, which miiight be my personal favorite. The gear is the same as in most of “Defense Highway”, except there’s a ‘stack’ instead of a splash. The change to two floor toms at 5:11 contributes a dynamic contrast.
The verses of this one feature a fun, energetic drum ‘n’ bass feel, as does the brief sax solo section at 1:19 – 1:31. During the choruses, the cymbal orchestration strictly follows/complements the chord progression, regardless of time signature. The first (full) one is more subdued, but I launch off some fireworks for the second, hehe.
During the ‘dirge’ section, I wanted to play as simple, direct and powerful as possible; there are a few little syncopations here and there to spice it up, however. The 8th-note pedal hats at 3:51 complement the guitar+sax, then the change to the edge of the ride as a time source provides a bit more urgency.
Skipping ahead, towards the end of the tune Gabe wanted a bit more improv on my end, so I jammed around and wrote some stuff just prior to tracking (much like the first drum solo in “Defense Highway”); this comprises 7:03 – 7:08. Afterwards, I move into my original idea of some syncopated double bass, increasing in note value to cap off the song with utmost intensity.
Full drum set transcription
Tempo = 170 BPM
Tempo change (2:20 – 2:47) = ‘linear decrease’ to 60 BPM, tempo remains at 60 until end
Josh Davis has written an article on The Gabriel Construct, half of which was published in the Delmarva Daily Times. The full text can be found below:
It’s fitting that the liner notes to “Interior City,” the new album by The Gabriel Construct, feature the phrase “welcome home.” The new CD by vocalist, composer and multi-instrumentalist Gabrial Lucas Riccio features players from Salisbury, Selbyville, Ocean Pines, Bethesda and Annapolis.
The album was also produced locally, at West Main Recording in Salisbury.
Riccio began playing piano in the 3rd grade, and started experimenting with electronic music in middle school. At Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania, where he graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in Music in 2011, Riccio composed mostly chamber music.
“I developed quite a stockpile of material prior to properly recording a record,” he said. “I had many groups of songs which could be records of their own, all in distinct styles. After graduating, I started writing full time. ‘Interior City’ was simply the album which ended up being completed first – perhaps because it was the album I most needed to get out of my system.”
The final product, which took more than a year to record and master, is a sprawling full-length record reminiscent of artists from Bach to King Crimson.
“I attempt to listen to all of the music I possibly can in as many different styles as possible, and learn something about all of it in order to add more tools to my toolbox,” Riccio said. “The genres I have explored most are rock, jazz, classical, underground rap and electronic music, and world traditions such as Balinese Gamelan and Indian classical music – but I’m always open to exploring new styles.”
The album’s second track, “Ranting Prophet,” cycles through many of those genres.
“That song began with a leftover piece of my string quartet, and I ended up incorporating all sorts of things into that basic framework – a quotation of 20th Century French composer Olivier Messiaen, a double-drum part using a sampled ’80s Genesis beat which turns polymetric in the bridge, Arabic vocal ornaments, blast beats, a Nine Inch Nails-style yelled vocal approach, [Charles] Mingus-style simultaneous soloing in the intro, and a violin solo which quotes [Béla] Bartók’s string quartets,” he said. “I hadn’t intended to incorporate so many different influences into the song – it simply ended up coming out that way in a natural fashion.”
Much of the supporting cast for “Interior City” was cobbled together after a chance meeting.
“At a doctor’s appointment, a nurse started telling me how her son was an audio engineer with a local studio,” Riccio said. “Of course, I assumed this meant he was a teenager with a ‘studio’ in his basement, but then she told me that he had credits on Train and Shinedown records. I couldn’t believe that someone with credits like those could be in Salisbury, so I decided to look him up online, and it all turned out to be true.”
Riccio scheduled a meeting with engineer Garrett Davis, who then suggested drummer Travis Orbin play on the album.
“I had been a fan of Travis since high school, as he is somewhat of a local legend, most notorious for playing in the DC-based band Periphery,” Riccio said “I was floored; I couldn’t believe that there was a possibility that I could get someone that talented to play on my debut!”
Orbin recommended bassist Thomas Murphy and producer Taylor Larson, who mixed and mastered “Interior City.” The rest of the lineup consists of longtime collaborators.
“I knew that I wanted David Stivelman to play the guitar on the album, since we had been friends since first grade and he was an incredibly talented player,” said Riccio. “Sophia Uddin and Soren Larson were both college classmates who had previously performed my chamber music, and I’ve been dating Sophia for two-and-a-half years now.”
Joe Borzotta, Riccio’s mother’s cousin, painted the album’s cover.
Riccio said he has already begun recording the next two TGC records. First and foremost, however, he wants to put a touring band together.
“I am moving to Chicago in a month to assemble a live lineup to perform ‘Interior City,’” Riccio said. “I plan to record half of the second TGC album with session players here, and the other half with said live lineup. I am also working on a full-length record with local progressive rock band Ocuplanes from Ridgely, Maryland, out of my newly constructed home studio.
“Lastly, I am slowly writing and recording a collaborative pop record with Travis Orbin, the drummer on all of the TGC material. I would also like to release an album of classical chamber music at some point, as I have quite a bit written that I would like to release in a more formal fashion.”
“Interior City” is available on Amazon.com and iTunes, or through Riccio’s website thegabrielconstruct.com.”
I was recently hired to transcribe and create sheet music for six songs by City and Colour (two from each of their albums). My transcriptions of these songs are for sale at their official website and can also be found below:
On the subject of transcriptions, Trey Gunn of King Crimson discovered and praised my transcription of the band’s ‘The ConstruKction of Light’:
Amazing! King #Crimson transcription> “The ConstruKction of Light”. This guy did his homework. Click to Dload score. youtu.be/6kd5kG4847I
I created this transcription of ‘The ConstruKction of Light’ for my senior comprehensive music exam at Swarthmore college. It was performed in a quartet arrangement, with myself on drums and vocals, Tony Blekicki and Swarthmore physics professor Carl Grossman on guitar, and Ben Rachbach playing the Warr Guitar part on a keyboard. Unfortunately, the performance was not recorded.
Note that the guitars and the Warr Guitar sound an octave below where written.
I also recently created piano arrangements of two songs by Animals as Leaders.
If you like what you see here, know that I am available for hire! I can offer a number of transcription/copying services (creating sheet music for your band from an audio file, creating digital scores from handwritten scores, transposing scores) in addition to session vocals and keyboards, production, arrangement, and composition. If you would like to hire me for any of this or can think of anything else you’d like to have me do, please email thegabrielconstruct@gmail.com and I can send you my resume!
If you would like sheet music for Interior City, the full score and parts books for piano, drums, bass, guitar, saxophone, and violin are for sale on the stores page.
Gabriel’s Notes: You can hear influences from Failure, drum-n-bass, barbershop quartets, Debussy, and more in this 10 minute song which alternates between full band sections and stripped down interludes (mostly solo piano). Thanks to the song’s frequent tempo changes and numerous sections in free rhythm (which are thus of indeterminate length), it had to be tracked in multiple chunks and somewhat out of order. This song contains the oldest music on the album – I actually wrote the piano part in my sophomore year of high school, nearly 10 years ago. It was only the second piece I ever wrote for live instruments, with Inner Sanctum being the third, written immediately afterwards. They were originally conceived together as part of a disastrous 30 minute long solo piano suite, which has also served as the source material for three songs that will appear on the next two TGC albums. While creating a full band arrangement of Defense Highway in the year leading up to recording, I revised its structure, removing some parts (which became another 11 minute long song) and adding a piano interlude based around the chord progression which ends Inner Sanctum.
Travis’s Notes: There’s much to say about this one, so I’ll begin with the gear. The tune starts with the same setup as “Subway Dwellers” (except w/ my flat ride on the right), switches to dual floor toms for the big mid-song climax, back to rack/floor for the first drum solo (more on that later, of course), a hybrid style kit consisting of 12″/14″ MDM hats, my 4″x14″ Pearl maple piccolo snare (same one I used on SD, but tensioned high) and Reference brass snare for the drum ‘n’ bass section, and finally back to the regular kit for the ‘noise’ solo and the rest of the tune.
Once the drums enter at 0:28, it stays upbeat and energetic until the first tempo change. There’s some dual ride stuff at 2:40 – 2:42 and a brief ‘chick – splash’ pedal hat ostinato at 2:57 – 3:04. For the big mid-song climax, I felt that the dual floor tom setup would generate a more powerful and dramatic feel. The cymbal mutes at the close of this part (4:32) complement the very next piano note that follows. (You can see me grabbing the china before as well so it doesn’t bleed into the mics – that one isn’t ‘timed’, heh).
For the first drum solo, I didn’t write anything ahead of time but I figured out what I wanted to do just before we recorded. There’s a bit of improv within the transitioning to each part, similarly to the bridge in Pete P’s “Death Country”. It was important to do it this way, as the accents are crucial to the piece (one on the downbeat of every bar but the fourth, then nothing on the downbeat at the end). When we tracked this I had Garrett loop the click, I went for it several times and we kept the best take. You can see me motioning to Gabe a ‘meh’ sort of hand signal regarding the take I had just completed before launching into the one that made the album, haha. I think those are 16th septuplets at the very end. Anyone wanna transcribe this for fun?
I had a bunch of fun writing parts for the drum ‘n’ bass section. Originally, Gabe wanted a simple part underneath and a crazy part overdubbed, but I made it my goal to write something so bitchen it nearly sounded as if two drummers were playing, hehe. Gabe really highlighted this and brought it out with his amazing use of panning. The transitional sections are played on my regular brass snare and larger hats for contrast.
Skipping ahead to the ‘noise’ solo, this one was also a ton of fun, which is obvious if you watch the unabridged version that I’ve tacked on at the end. I think Gabe originally programmed a bunch of gibberish (apologies if not! haha) and I thought it’d be cool to just throw a mess of sticks on my kit and have him run around the room like a madman, making as much noise as possible. I left my other floor tom set up with some cymbals scattered about on the ground for him, plus there was an old, out-of-tune piano in the live room which was perfect, haha. None of this was timed to the click or pre-conceived, of course. We tracked so much stuff that some of it had to be cut in addition to the whole thing being chopped in half and layered on top of the initial half. It was a bit difficult, but I edited my footage to sync up with the first half as best as I could.
Skipping ahead, the song becomes upbeat and energetic upon reverting to its initial tempo of 132 at 10:02. There’s some flashy stuff once I move to the china, including a floor/snare triplet flam – a Colaiuta trademark. The ride bell at the end is played with the tip of my stick for less abrasion, and I move to the bow when the melody drops. The mute at the end is timed to complement the piano.
And as always, there’s even more complementation present:
0:55 – extra snare on ‘and’ of 4, vocals
1:10 – 1:24 – hi-hat accents, vocal melody
1:38 – 1:45 – cymbal accents, bass/distorted piano stabs
3:03 – 3:26 – cymbal orchestration, chord progression
6:06 – 6:15 – cymbal orchestration, vocal melody
7:47 – pedal splash, piano mash
10:06 – 10:11 – low crash/splash, vocal melody
Full drum set transcription
Tempo (0:28, when drums enter) = 132 BPM
Tempo change (3:34) = 100 BPM
Tempo (5:10 – 5:35) = free, very slow
Tempo change (5:35) = 145 BPM
Tempo (6:17 – 7:31) = free, very slow
Tempo change (7:31) = 100 BPM
Tempo (7:48 – 8:26) = free, very slow
No tempo/’noise’ solo (8:26 – 8:50)
Tempo (8:50 – 9:30) = free, very slow
Tempo change (9:30) = 100 BPM
Tempo change (10:02) = 132 BPM
Tempo change (10:26 – 10:32) = 126/122/119 BPM (ritard)
This week, I’d like to take a break from talking about Interior City to share some of my chamber music with you. Here is a video of ‘Between Entwines’, a collaborative work which Sophia Uddin (the violinist on Interior City) and I wrote and performed together.
This video is from our debut performance of the work at the second annual Swarthmore College Student & Alumni Composers Concert in Lang Concert Hall on October 29, 2011.
Program notes: ‘Between Entwines’ was written during the summer of 2011. It began when Gabriel sent Sophia a tiny sketch for her to augment and return. It continued to grow from there, mostly through email correspondence, with some additional work done in chat boxes and in person. It is intended to be the first entry in a series of piano/violin collaborations using the same set of motives.
Sheet music for Between Entwines can be purchased on the Stores page and can be viewed below:
Before Between Entwines and Interior City, Sophia was a member of The Mandelbrot Quartet, who performed some movements I wrote for string quartet. Here is a video of their final performance of these movements at a split concert with the jazz quartet Menage on April 22, 2011 in Lang Concert Hall:
I began writing the quartet with the ‘Interruptions’ movement, a hyperactive expression of crazed joy. The title was actually devised by Gerald Levinson, my composition teacher at the time, as the piece constantly interrupts itself. The harmonic language of the movement (chromatic contrary motion) was inspired by Ligeti’s first string quartet, while the structure was inspired by Stravinsky’s Symphonies of Wind Instruments. ‘Hedonistic Ritual’ is a short, fast and angry movement which was inspired by seeing this Dillinger Escape Plan concert and wanting to bring some of that anarchic energy to a classical concert hall.
Here is The Mandelbrot Quartet’s debut performance of ‘Interruptions’ from the first annual Swarthmore College Student and Alumni Composers Concert in Lang Concert Hall on November 6, 2010:
At the same concert, I participated in a performance of Ben Starr’s vocal composition ‘Assumpta est Maria’:
As a side note, the closing number of the Mandelbrot/Menage concert was a joint performance of Keith Jarrett’s ‘The Wind Up’ with both Mandelbrot and Menage. It’s not often that you get to see a jazz quartet and a string quartet perform together!
There is much exciting news in the world of Travis Orbin! Firstly, he has officially joined Darkest Hour. Secondly, he is recording two solo EPs for release (hopefully) later this year, ‘Projects’ and ‘Silly String’. He has just posted a song from ‘Silly String’ on youtube:
Gabriel’s Notes: The chord progression of the opening theme is a reversal of the progression used in Thelonious Monk’s ‘I Mean You’, and the dominant and tritone harmonies throughout reflect that influence – but the texture is drawn more from ’90s garage rock, only with a distorted piano instead of distorted guitars, as this song features no guitar whatsoever. The bridge features a subtle reprise of the album’s opening song. This is the only song where I didn’t give Tom a basic bass line to work with – just a piano part. I recorded three complete takes of the piano part for this song and then spliced the best parts of each together.
The wall of sound / sonic landscape production style used on Interior City is something I’ve always been drawn to – Strapping Young Lad’s ‘Alien‘ album is a great example. This song has a particularly high quotient of ambient noise behind all of the basic instrumental parts, including many speech samples. However, the chattering that runs through the background of Interior City does more than just add texture – it also serves a purpose in the story, highlighting and contributing to the character’s paranoia.
Travis’s notes: In “Subway Dwellers” — one of the few tunes on the album that possesses more of a pop sensibility — I’m playing some syncopated closed hat parts in the first verse (subtle crescendo beginning at 3:11 to provide a ‘lift’ into the pre-chorus), and a marching-esque part in the second, with light pedal splashing on the quarters. The two quick kicks and snare+china complement the vocal at 5:19. I sought to build the section starting at 6:02 by first playing my closed 13″ hats, then a ‘barking’ hat pattern before launching into a fun, colorful cymbal orchestration at 6:37.
On this song, I used my Pearl 4″x14″ maple piccolo snare.
Cymbals: 21″ DRK ride, 20″ MDM ride, 18″ & 19″ MDM medium crashes, 14″ MDM hi-hats, 8″ BRT splash, 13″ BRT/DRK hi-hats, 19″ LTD china (older model).
Gabriel’s Notes: I heard the first part of this little song in a dream I had in the summer of 2011, and the second half was drawn from an old progressive metal demo I had sitting around. It’s meant to be both an intro to Subway Dwellers (and therefore includes a transformation of the opening melody of that song) and an introduction to some of the motives and musical themes which appear in the final song. The idea for a short and fast song leading into a slower and longer song with the same main theme came from the ‘Broken’ suite by Tears for Fears, and the idea to compress Subway’s more rhythmically dynamic theme into straight eighth notes for this song was drawn from the ending of Stravinsky’s ‘Firebird’.
Travis’s notes: “Retreat Underground” features a bit of melodic complementation during the transitional 5-4 bars and a hypnotic tom-tom part during the middle section. I launch into an exciting latin-esque groove in 3-4 at 1:43. The parts are further intensified with some double bass and loud crashing afterwards.
On this song, I used my ‘ol’ faithful’, my Reference brass snare.
Cymbals: 21″ DRK ride, 18″ & 19″ ICON medium crashes, 14″ MDM hi-hats, 8″ BRT splash, 13″ BRT/DRK hi-hats, 19″ LTD china (older model).
Gabriel’s Notes: This song is a tribute to my father, who is fascinated by alien conspiracy theories. The lyrics are drawn from his extensive library on the subject (and are used here to further express the paranoia of this story’s main character), and the music is inspired by sci-fi b-movie soundtracks – particularly that of the X-Files, one of my father’s favorite shows. As a result, it is the only song on the album to use prominent synths. Tom came up with a bass line for this one – a pattern in 9/8, reminiscent of Tool, which repeats twice in full then cuts itself off the third time. I went through multiple revisions of the drum part with Travis, and he ended up tracking it in a single take.
I cannot thank my father enough for making this album a reality. Without him, it would not exist.
Travis’s Notes: This is the tune that I alluded to in the “Fear of Humanity” video description; it was tracked entirely with the dual floor tom setup. In Gabe’s demo, the tom-toms and snare sounded quite big and ballsy, and I wanted to retain those textures/tones. The only discrepancy between the two setups are the 14″ MDM hats instead of 15″ MDMs.
And as always, there’s a bunch of complementation present:
2:10 – triplet on hats, piano
2:19 – 2:21 – hats orchestration, vocal melody
3:40 – 3:43 – crashes/china, vocal melody
3:56 – 3:57 – crashes/china/tom-toms, synth melody
4:09 – 4:10 – accented tom-tom quintuplet melody, synth melody
4:18 – 4:19 – double kick flams complement nothing; sometimes you just gotta play some double kick flams
