ROBERT AND EMILY BLACKMORE
DISTANCE
DISTANCE was another chance.
The months following Motive’s 2019 release were eventful. We got married, moved in together, and I left my day job with the earnings of Motives.
Oh, and then the world fell apart.
During lockdown, we had plenty of time to do, well, nothing. Recoiling from the trauma of the deaths of loved ones, the abrupt change of COVID-19 to the world, and the reprisal of a long-term stalker, we used the studio as a method of escape.
The DISTANCE E.P. is the presentable moments of what was recorded over those long eighteen months.
01. Post-Grad
August 10, 2020.
Post-Grad was an orphan from the Motives era. The song was written and half recorded by the time the album left writing and entered production. When unpacking some of the remaining boxes at our new apartment, Emily discovered the stems for Post-Grad on a hard drive. She handed it over to me to finish recording and master. I was going through some reflective work at the time - my childhood was rough, to say the least. I was listening over the master copy of the track while I was burning a yearbook from my sophomore year. I chose to name it Post-Grad for that feeling of letting go.
02. Something More Than Me
June 22, 2020
Something More Than Me was an answer to two questions: “What if we tried bluegrass?” and “How much alcohol will kill us?”
Simply put, we got kinda close to bluegrass - like if someone wrote it based on a description that was lost in translation. As far as alcohol, turns out we didn’t have a large enough sample set to collect data and form a conclusion.
03. Hyacinth
July 5, 2020
The purple hyacinth is the most common flower used in funeral arrangements. It’s used to symbolize loss, and is often given as a display of sympathy for those who have lost someone important.
Music has always been an avenue to help me cope with feelings that I don’t know how to navigate, including grief. There was someone in my life who was always quick to support my pursuit of music far before I ever showed any potential. She taught me that, despite having lived with a myriad of reasons to act to the contrary, those who are speaking evil will never triumph those who are doing good. She taught me that strength is determined by your deeds and actions; the ability to choose what is right over what is easy.
“Crying doesn’t mean you’re weak. It just means you have a heart.”
Violet A. Jobe
2.13.46 - 7.2.20
04. Distance
February 2, 2020.
Distance was where we took full advantage of the new living situation - a spacious apartment with enough room for a full studio. Acoustic instruments were everything this time around, mostly because of the lack of noise and intruding nephews. After enough stomping and clapping to make the neighbors think we’re establishing a cult, we finished the track roughly the same day we started. We named the track Distance due to how isolated we felt at the new apartment. Imagine how we felt when the lockdowns started two months later
05. Rememberance
August 30, 2021
We were moving again, this time back home to the place where I wrote Motives. We decided to leave after one too many issues with our landlord, this time was a ruptured pipe that ended up ruining over $15,000 of equipment.
We were planning to break down (what remained) of the studio that day. I sat down at my piano to give it one last go-around before powering everything down and loading it up. Feeling heavy with the events of the last year and a half, I played something soft and memorial. I recorded the take, shut down the computer, and started unplugging and boxing up.
The following week, Emily brought her kalimba out of storage to contribute to the track. With everything lost, left behind, and recovered, we titled the track “Remembrance”.
