Mark Anthony K. joined Preston Frazier for a talk about Projekt Gemineye’s upcoming new theme project, ‘Canada: Stories and Legends’:
PRESTON FRAZIER: How did you decide on the theme for ‘Canada: ‘Stories and Legends’?
MARK ANTHONY K: I thought to myself, “What can I talk about that I haven’t spoken about so far in my lyrics?” I came up with Canada as a subject because I was looking through some old photos and came across some photos of myself and some of my old bands when we were touring Canada. I thought some of the pictures looked fantastic. We were in Prince Edward Island and Nova Scotia. There were pictures of us in Winnipeg, and when I saw them, it brought me back to that time when we were traveling. We were young at that time, and we didn’t know much about Canada. We hardly went out of our province of Ontario, so we didn’t know what was surrounding us.
Once we got out there and started driving around, we discovered what a fantastic country this was, not only geographically, but once we started meeting some of the people on the East Coast and across the country. There were a lot of generous people that we met and very fantastic people, and we learned a lot just through our travels. So I thought, why not make a record, a sort of love letter from me to Canada and what I appreciate about the country? Of course, like you, I wasn’t just praising it. I also wanted to give an equal view of it. I can’t honestly say that Canada is a perfect country. I wanted to make sure I touched on some of that as well.
PRESTON FRAZIER: The songs are detailed lyrically. The theme is a break from what you last did, but most of your projects are stand-alone works.
MARK ANTHONY K: Yes, I’ve been working on many things. Every day, I come down to my music room, open up my computer, and if something comes to me, whether it’s a keyboard piece or a guitar piece, I’ll just start recording. The ideas may turn to nothing, or they may turn into songs. I’ve been fortunate of late that I’ve had a good source of inspiration, to the point that I have not only this record done but also another one already finished of Projekt Gemineye material. I love writing, the process of writing, and the process of recording music, so I just keep writing and writing and writing.
PRESTON FRAZIER: Let’s start with the first single from the album. Tell us a little bit about “The Lost Generation.”
MARK ANTHONY K: “The Lost Generation” is a topic that is a little controversial.
It’s about the government and the Church of Canada, which took thousands of native children from their families and their tribes and put them in these sorts of private schools to make them Catholic, get them away from their way of life, and try to turn down the white man’s way, It didn’t go very well. In the 2000s, there was a discovery of unmarked graves containing many of those who resisted and tried to escape. The lyrics of this song were meant to be more like a message … a warning of mistakes that could have happened back then and not to make the same mistakes again. Musically, I thought it had a lot of solid parts in it. It is probably one of my favorite guitar solos I’ve done.
PRESTON FRAZIER: Your mix is perfect. Every instrument is straightforward, even though there are many layers. Let’s go to “Drive North.”
MARK ANTHONY K: That one was fun to do. I have a Roland RD08, an absolutely fantastic program with weighted keys. It inspires me to play the piano more. The piano riff came to me one evening while fiddling around with it. It grew once I set it to a click and started recording it and adding stuff to it. Then, all the guitars came in. I found that this is one of the songs where I left the piano and keyboards a little bit more prominent. Lyrically, it was a topic matter that I found fascinating. It was about the gold rush era of the late 1800s and early 1900s. Many people went to the Yukon, a province in Canada.
It’s estimated that 100,000 people participated in the Klondike Gold Rush, and 30,000 of them made it to Dawson City, one of the main cities in the province. By 1901, though, when the first census was taken, the population had declined to 9,000. So, obviously, the moral of this is that people dreamed of becoming rich instantly, then realized it was hard work to find this gold. Some of them ended up staying to become farmers. Some became merchants, and some didn’t survive. You know, they went there, they looked for gold. You know, some of them found it, some didn’t. I like the imagery of people firing up their wagons, going up there through the harsh weather, and some of them finding gold. And some of them were like, “Man, this is, I don’t know. I don’t think this is a good idea. Let’s turn around,”
PRESTON FRAZIER: Lyrically, it’s pretty intense. It takes you on that journey, and you can visualize it. The music is compelling. You weren’t trying to do all the twiddly stuff with the piano. It was just really direct rock ‘n’ roll piano playing. Let’s shift to the song “Ghost Ship.”
MARK ANTHONY K: It starts with the sound effects of the waves and water and the birds flying around in the background. Lyrically, the story of the ship is direct. The story was developed when I went on tour with my band. We went to Nova Scotia several times, and I remember one time talking to this older gentleman. We were staying at this person’s house. It’s because, in Nova Scotia, it’s widespread for them to say after they go to a concert and you play, somebody will come to you and say, “Hey, if you don’t have a place to stay tonight, you’re welcome to come to our house.” We took somebody up on the offer and had dinner with an older grandfather. He was telling me a lot of legends of Nova Scotia and about this ghost ship; that there was a legend that it sometimes appears when you go out near the straight of Northumberland, which is between Prince Edward Island and Nova Scotia. He said people had seen a ship going down the waters there that suddenly burst into flames, sank, and then rose from the water. It was an exciting story. It went well with the topic because it is tied to Canada, that whole country area.
PRESTON FRAZIER: Let’s discuss the album epic, “Racing the Flames.”
MARK ANTHONY K: “Racing the Flames” is one that I liked doing. At 12 minutes long, I didn’t have to confine myself to conventional song structures. I wrote it with no limit on what I was going to do. The piano at the beginning is prominent. I’m a big fan of the Hammond organ. I’ve always loved Tony Kay and his Hammond organ sound, and I have some great Hammond in this song. I’m also thrilled with the verses because they were rhythmic parts I hadn’t done before in any Projekt Gemineye song. Lyrically, this is about something that we Canadians know very well, and I’m sure other places in the world do too as well, especially now that the world is getting a little bit warmer every year, is forest fires. There have been some bad fires in the country over the last few years. It’s basically just a story about a forest fire, and people sometimes are told to evacuate the area and get out of harm’s way from the racing flames. It’s a race against time. The song’s imagery is very strong, and I think the music helps tell the story.
PRESTON FRAZIER: It is an epic, so it has different parts. You initially talked about the Hammond organ, but is there a church organ, too?
MARK ANTHONY K: Yes, I’ve always been a lover of the church organ. I have always loved that our church had a man with a fantastic pipe organ. The church had an incredible organ. I’ve always had a soft spot for that sound. I have a setting called Cathedral, and I wanted to use it in that section. There’s a section of the song that sounds like a mini hymn. It fits with the theme of people leaving their area and seeking asylum and a respite from the fires.
PRESTON FRAZIER: There is also a Moog-like section …
MARK ANTHONY K: I love Moog. I have the Gaia here. I also have my Novation-based Asian keyboards, which will have fantastic Moog sounds. I’m a big Rick Wakeman fan! I’ve said it before, and I’m sure you’ve heard me mention it on your podcast a few times, but I have a pretty big collection of Rick Wakeman stuff, you know, the vinyl CDs.
PRESTON FRAZIER: The song “The Promised Life” brought the band Rush to my mind. The beginning sounds almost like a 12-string electric guitar. Then it goes to a synth from the 1970s era, and then you have this driving lead guitar line going through it.
MARK ANTHONY K: You’re pretty spot on. The beginning was very much a 12-string affair. I used my double-neck electric 12-string guitar. Because of the topic, I wanted to make this one a little more driving and angsty. The topic is not exclusive to Canada, but it is something that’s been on people’s minds here quite a lot, and that is immigration. What I meant to write about here is that there was a very well-known segment of time here that I remember where our prime minister, Mr. Trudeau was openly welcoming immigrants to Canada, saying, “Come to our country. We have lots of space, and we’re the melting pot.” Of course, he didn’t discuss the next steps for the immigrants. Coming from Eastern Europe, they landed in Canada and shook hands with the Prime Minister, and that was it. They got little support, and many ended up sleeping in church basements for months. After that, some of these people ended up sleeping on the streets. Why are you telling people to come here and bring them over when they end up in maybe worse condition than they were in their homeland? What’s very important to me is to correct this sort of situation.
PRESTON FRAZIER: I see a multi-panel CD and a download are already on sale. Will ‘Canada: Stories and Legends’ be on vinyl?
MARK ANTHONY K: Absolutely. You will get a CD and a vinyl from this, and I have some good ideas for the extras because I never put out a vinyl record without any sort of extras. Of course, being that I’m a Canadian, the extras now, the ideas came plentiful to me, what I could possibly put in as an extra. I think people will be pleased with this release, not only musically but also because it is very important to have something with it while you’re listening to it. Having the lyrics on the vinyl and CD is important for following along, and it also sets the mood. I like doing those sorts of things, and that’s strictly because of my love of Kiss and bands that used to add those things to their vinyl release when they were famous. The single came out on Canadian Thanksgiving, so it was purposefully done as a Canadian tribute. I’m pretty sure the vinyl will be in my hands after Christmas, probably after New Year, and probably in January.
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