Tracklist:

1. Born Into Pain (ft Nuff X) (Remix)
2. What The World Needs
3. Who You Pushin'
4. 1 In 4 Crack
5. Black Holes For Eyes
6. For All Life Could Have Been
7. Dead End Smash Up

Bonus Tracks:
8. Who You Pushin' (Remix)
9. What The World Needs (CleanDub Mix)
10. 1 In 4 Crack (4 Loopy Crack Whores Remix)

This EP was intended as a sort of sequel to The Long Dark Tunnel, and there are elements of overlap, stylistically, thematically and collaboratively. Nuff X, who did a couple of remixes of tracks from that previous EP (and one from Hometown...) stepped in with a full collaborative song this time round. He'd initially asked me to write and record vocals for a track he'd written called "Born Into Pain". After I sent him my lyrics, he scrapped the few lines he had written and wrote new ones, and reworked the track. This remix I did was based off the original version.

Looking at the dates I have for these tracks, it seems the EP was largely written between 10th August and 17th November. However, there's a couple of earlier outliers: "What The World Needs" seems to have first been written and recorded probably a day or two prior to 4th July 2006 (this file is labeled as a "2nd mix"), with a final mix being done in November. Meanwhile, the two versions of "Who You Pushin'" were actually written a year earlier. These were apparently written around 10th/11th September 2005 for Stain (aka Stained Art) to rap over, though it seems he never actually used either track, so I reclaimed them.

At a technical level, this EP is a bit of a step up. This was the first project where I used VSTi's instead of just samples, though there are still string and bass samples used in there. There's also a noticeable improvement on my vocals, and although they're still a tad stilted in places, mostly they sound more comfortable and confident, like I was starting to find my vocal style. Some of the vocal FX are still a bit overbearing at times too, but generally they're cleaner and sounding better. Honestly, I was pleasantly surprised by them.

Another bit of technical trivia to note: at some point in the summer of 2006 I'd gotten hold of a demo version of FL Studio 6, and though I don't think I ever wrote a track in it, the guitar-synth sound on "What The World Needs" was done with the Slayer plug-in in that DAW.

This EP is actually better than I was expecting. The lyrics hold up pretty well, vocally, I was starting to find my feet. The arrangements and production are generally pretty solid. The synth guitars are still a bit of a weak point, though they are better handled than on Long Dark Tunnel. Aye, I'm quite pleased with this EP in retrospect. There's a sense of development, even if the musical ideas aren't necessarily that fresh for me. (It occurrs to me that I'm maybe being a bit harsh on myself there: I can see that there's stylistic and compositional similarities to Doesn't Mean A Thing, but even though that was two albums and an EP earlier, the actual time span is really only a year or so. Is it fair to say that having two projects utilising the same musical ideas in a 12-14 month span is a symptom of creative stagnation? I think with the speed of technical developments that happened between them, it's reasonable to go for a second bite of the cherry, so to speak.)

Finally, I should give a shout out to fellow SC Garbage Can denizens Midge McKay, who let me use his photos for the cover art, and to And-Y (aka OneMob) for the remix of "1 In 4 Crack" that was included in the bonus tracks. Cheers lads!

There was a re-mix of this EP done around 13th October 2008 - and I don't seem to have re-recorded the vocals, just cleaned up the mix, which again shows the relative strength of them. As with Hometown Breakz & Blooze, there seems to have been a second attempt at a re-mix between February and April 2010, though again, only three tracks were done. I'm still assuming that was because I got busy with the Not For Sale EP at that time. It will be the Oct 2008 mix that I'll make available.