On October 18th, 2024 I released the first “album” of material from the podcast and assembled it into a cohesive work. Most of the music from the podcast of The Poe Underground has been recorded sequentially and close enough in time, that often time the songs share commonalities. At first I was a bit apprehensive of trying to assemble an “album” and simply planned on releasing the work as a “best of”, but then realized that the songs can and do work as a unit.
Part of assembling an album is choosing a sequence of songs that works best, deciding on the spacing between the songs, and finally mastering the songs so that the sonic signature works as a whole. Completing the final touches of naming the album and designing the cover work are two steps I took equal pleasure in working on. Originally I was going to call the album Night Opera (The Dusk Cometh) after the third track. I figured this title might confuse people and mistake the album and project as a work of opera. I chose Radio Night Poems, as I had already chosen these songs as a group based on the common theme of many of the poems that mention evening, dusk, and simply the night-time.
While many of the poems on the album are my own, you will also find poems by T.S. Eliot, Amy Lowell, Robert Browning, and Percy Shelley. In the end, I am very pleased with the final result of re-mastering and assembling this album as I feel that I have done the songs justice by doing this.
While this is the second album for The Poe Underground, it’s approach was radically different than the first album Neptune: Dreams of Venus, as the knowledge that I was working on an album was already known to me from the start. Radio Night Poems, was and is a bonus and I feel a great accompaniment to the podcast.
You may listen to Radio Night Poems in its entirety here for free.
D.K. Mckenzie – November 25th, 2024