The most important record to be released this Sunday is now online at Mr. Furious Records. It doesn’t have guns. It doesn’t have roses. But neither does Chinese Democracy. Arturo Got The Shaft – the long dead musical project of your humble editor – is pleased to announce the posthumous release of its first and only full length, A Life Without Fireflies.

Photo: Daniel Austin

The record is free for download and released under CC 3.0, leaving anyone to do anything with it so long as Axl Rose, the recording industry or the Bush Administration does not somehow directly benefit. Accompanying the download package is album art featuring (d)N0t photographer Daniel Austin and extensive liner notes from Rob and the album’s producer, C. Howie Howard.

Available in the (d)N0t archives is the blog series documenting the “Making Of” Fireflies chocked full of behind-the-scenes juice. The feature series details the heated studio exchanges, long shot gambles and at least one incident with a police officer that were required to get these songs on wax.

Five years ago some friends and I made a record that never saw the light of day until now. The relevance and esteem we had for these recordings only grew with time and have never been more important than now.

The album in its entirety is available for both stream and download. Hopefully your life without fireflies ends today.

Some years ago, work began to produce a rock and roll record reflective of the new and horrifying times in which we now live.  Blood and sweat were sewn into ones and zeros constructing a single creative package of ambition, fury and sarcasm.  It aimed to be the unified theory of musicianship; a single record that married the format of popular song with the zeitgeist.  It meant to be truly all things to all people.  But like all artistic endeavors that reach beyond one’s grasp, it iterated itself into oblivion.  The project was the record producing equivalent of a land war in Asia – an endless resource sink that finally drove its investors insane with heartsickness.

But, a principal creative force never let the old girl go, pushing through the Sisyphan task until finally after extraordinary delay it will see the light of day next month.  On 23 November 2008, a new record for a new age will be released.

I am, of course, not referring to Guns N’ Roses’ Chinese Democracy.

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When I was in college, I started a little band with a silly name manned by a rotating cast of memorable characters.  We played around the Midwest, participating in a unique spectrum of Nebraska musicmakers fostering what we felt was genuine and fun community.

In 2003, a buddy of mine and I made a record in my final semester.  Recorded in the fledging studio of his new record label, it represented a singular creative statement for both Howie and Iinvolved – one that we have all in some way tried and failed to articulate again.  Since then, we all drifted apart, continuing on the natural journeys that one follows after schooling.   The record was left an aborted exercise that has gathered dust for five years.

Ever since, Howie and I never lost our affection for those songs, finding with each year that passed they only became more relevant.  Interpreted as easily post-Iraq as post-9/11, it has always been a personal regret that the record never made it beyond a close circle of friends.  With the tumultuous year that has been globally, locally and musically, Howie and I agreed there could be no better time to finally put this thing out than now.

After much deliberation and debate, Arturo Got The Shaft is releasing its first and only studio full-length A Life Without Fireflies on Mr. Furious Records.  All the tunes will be released under MFR’s license of choice (Creative Commons with Attribution) and free to download when the clock strikes midnight on 23 November.  We’ll have a “Making of” series posted in the coming weeks as well as commentary and stories from both Howie and I, all of which will be available on the Mr. Furious website.