Mansions On The Moon - Lost And Found

We present you a special treat note from Mansions On The Moon, Lost And Found. After making waves within the music scene with their excellent Lightyears EP in 2012 and 2013’s Full Moon EP, the band has been putting together some new sounds for an upcoming full-length release in 2014. Before this year concludes, however, the quartet wanted to give a special “Thank You” gift to their fans by offering five unreleased demos that you can enjoy below. Lost and Found takes a closer look at the past and process of the band and has only been shared with those close to the band. Their raw and pared instrumentation transports us back to the time when they were first laid down in front of glowing computer screens. Or to put into the words of the band:

Some songs stay with us for years before release. All the tracks in “Lost and Found” eventually made their way out into the world, but after a complete transformation through the MOTM creative process. We love these versions. We hope you do, too.

Listen to the original recordings, Lost And Found, as well as the finished production recordings in the set below and read through the respective writing and production processes of each track version.

“Original Demos vs Previously Released Versions

1. Desert Island: Summer of 2011, Los Angeles, CA

This song was one of the first songs I wrote in Los Angeles, although, some of the words were written during a previous summer spent in Alaska. At the time of it’s recording we were living six deep (with two dogs) in a small apartment in Los Feliz, which we called The Space Castle. The apartment’s name derived from it’s very contemporary and modern decor. The Space Castle was completely white, including it’s unfinished floors, which the dogs soon turned a dingy sandstone.

The song was written during a rare moment of silence and solitude in The Space Castle with a bottle of Old Crow whisky and my newly purchased acoustic guitar. It was later released as part of our first EP, Light Years.

2. She Says: summer of 2008. Atlanta, GA

She Says (later released under the name “Lights Off”) was written by Ben and I while we were living in Atlanta, Georgia. We were working out of a room in The Artist Factory studios in Midtown ATL. At this time, Ben was focusing on producing hip-hop, R&B, and pop records while I was writing primarily with the acoustic guitar. We wrote it together on a rainy Saturday afternoon. Before we knew it would become one of the first songs released by Mansions on The Moon, which did not exist at the time of this recording.

3. To The One: summer of 2009, Virginia Beach, VA.

We spent the winter of 2009 in Boulder CO where Ben Hazlegrove, Lane Shaw, and Alex Botwin were working on music for their band Pnuma Trio. Ben and I received a call from Shay Haley of N.E.R.D. one random night. Shay explained that he heard our music via our mutual friend Shomi Patwary and was interested in meeting us and hearing more. We jumped on a plane to VA Beach the next day and met Shay and Chad Hugo at the Neptune’s studio. Our friend’s at Illusive Media documented the trip in a youtube video (Ben and Ted).  Soon after, Ben, Lane and I moved to Virginia Beach where we formed Mansions on the Moon and started work on our first release titled Paradise Falls.  

I wrote this song in my bedroom one evening in Virginia Beach.  It was written for the person we all hope exists but have not yet found. I met her several years later in Los Angeles. The song was first published on our Paradise Falls mix tape and was released under the name “To the One.” 

4. and 5. ”Trapped” and ”When You Come Around”. Fall of 2008 Roanoke, VA.

These two songs were written within a few days of each other. I don’t recall which came first, but they were written when I was house-sitting for Ben’s Mom at Ben’s childhood home in Roanoke, Virginia. Ben’s mom kept a custom-made guitar hidden under a bed which gave rise to a new variety of tunings and transversely inspired several new songs. Some of which are still working and plan on releasing in the near future. If you listen closely to both recordings you can hear Ben’s English Bulldog, Oscar, snoring. The “clanking” sound heard in the recording of “when you come around” is a wine glass I tapped in-time with a fork. In the unedited recording it broke and you can hear it shatter on the last bar. The words in these two compositions were later used in the songs Athens (which appeared on the Light Years EP) and Full Moon (which appeared on our latest “Full Moon EP”).