Raiden Freeman releases ‘Medias Res’, a companion album to 2022’s ‘Within The Speed Limit Of Love’

25 October 2023

Wellington, New Zealand based songwriter and producer Raiden Freeman (real name Jack Mells) has released his new album Medias Res on Bandcamp via Bankrupt Records, with streaming services to follow. This album is a collection of leftover tracks from the sessions of his 2022 album Within the Speed Limit of Love (originally conceived as a 90 minute double album) and beyond, featuring tracks from as far back as a collaboration with high school friends Maple Syrup in 2016. Here is a statement from the artist.

“Medias Res is from a lyric in the song Tiny Fez, a song I wrote and released but quickly took down in 2018 making its first record appearance here. I saw that someone Soundcloud to mp3’d it and still plays it on the radio. The anachronism is intentional as is the anachronism of declaring this my musical journey in medias res. Who knows or cares where I am in the journey? I always just feel that I’m walking into the play in the mid-way through.”

“These songs are leftover pieces from the original 90-minute sequencing of Within the Speed Limit of Love, which itself was originally conceived as the triumphant return of The Scrussian, tentatively titled Monoholy. The heavier songs Was Bobby Sands Proana? and Dr. Manhattan are evidence of this, my attempt at Mars Volta songs. I tried to play guitar like Sonny Sharrock. Two Selves is reimagining of Out on the Weekend by Neil Young. Tiny Fez is basically a PHF song. 22 was released in 2016 when I turned 22, the collaboration was made while Vera and Jerry were still living in LA. For Metanarrative (and a number of the WtSLoL songs), Hector brought over an Ensoniq on his bike, and we hurriedly tracked synth parts while he perched on the edge of my bed. I wanted Drag-On YHWH to sound like a twisted version of something from Bradley Cooper’s A Star is Born. My cover art design is a homage to ECM records. At the time of writing, I was playing Drakengard and NieR, watching Mizoguchi and Rossellini.”

“This album of leftover pieces will not win over any listeners who may have previously had trouble with my poor mixing and insistence on leaving in mistakes after one take. The microphone I was using at the time unbeknownst to me had one of the XLR pins fully pushed in which resulted in the crackling and noise you can hear all throughout. This partly pleased me, but the primary issue is that the project files of these songs are on a corrupted drive that I still need to see a man about, so I wasn’t able to edit them out before release. Consequently, this collection of leftovers has an uneven range of fidelities and concerns in a way that I hope is compelling. I see it as a kind of send-off to my previous habits before I adopt new ones.”

Medias Res is available on Bandcamp and all good streaming services.