Recently looked into my – quite multiple – bandcamp accounts and discovered that the very first album by my first band had been released around this time back in 2007. 18 years ago.

I was 18 years old myself when this project – Lacklustre Mirror – started out. Had zero comprehension how things are done back then, except for composing music which I did since early childhood.

The first album – The Book Of The Shattered Bonds – when it finally has become a reality, with a factory-pressed physical CD in my hands… Well, that was both my victory. And an utter defeat too.

I feel no shame for the music composed for it. But I’m also pretty much aware that my English back then was abysmal – I still cannot get rid of that Eastern European accent; the lyrics were poorly written and ripe with errors, grammar-wise. Vocally I was not trained well enough yet. Massive screw-ups with arrangements are there too.

And the overall sound… Truth is, the sound engineer we have been recording this LP with, had never worked with any kind of this music before, and I had tough time explaining to him what I wanted, and why this blasphemous amount of reverberation was a must.

The album felt like an icy-cold dream on the verge of a nightmare, and making it proved tough and painful so much that I felt zero joy when it was out eventually.

The label failed (and was never too eager) to sell the entire stock. And as far as I can say, the only song that got some exposure, was ‘Dark Water’.

The primary mistake was trying to play some kind of a progressive rock and consider it to be anywhere related to gothic music. Although mr. Mick Mercer praised this LP (and even more praised its follow-up).

Just listened to it. Really don’t want to find myself again in the same emotional space I’d been to when composing and arranging all of this. Even though the times are even darker now.

I’m forever grateful to those who helped me to make it, however, and in particular Celestial @Ir and Marea Internum. And I’m really sorry for being occasionally less than a decent person with them.

…Last night I walked back home after a very good gig. Really a good one. The night was relatively warm – especially for the mid-Winter, skies clear, stars and planet shone bright…

But my brain was wormed with a grim thought: what if everything was basically pointless? What if every technology we take for granted today will become a weird and incomprehensible sorcery for our rags-clad descendants in a generation or two? – those, who survive the upheaval which is to come?.. Was there any point in all those efforts, composing and recording the dark and sad music – or any other kind?..

I don’t know.