An Aviary will be my seventh full length album once I figure out how I want to release it. It was written between 2024-2025 and is currently undergoing some final mix tweaks, but otherwise, it is a fully finished collection. It’s composition and title are inspired by the idea of each song being a bird–individual entities that together form the leaves of a single tree–a nested family, alive and restless, creating different shapes as they come and go. 

After experimenting with country, indie rock, and venturing into more ‘guitar’ territory with the preceding records, I wanted to revisit making a ‘big pop’ record that delved into the influences and techniques I’d explored previously, expanding on my electronic leanings while merging them with more rock-oriented pop song. Early in the process, I imagined An Aviary as a seamless record where every song began using the ending pieces of the preceding song as compositional material. That concept became less important as I went, and ultimately the record became a broader statement on how I approach DIY pop music: as a space for experimentation that can pursue new structural and sonic directions without sacrificing emotional immediacy, accessibility, or energy.

An Aviary is included here as a representation of my work as a songwriter, producer, and computer musician, and as a culmination of my ongoing experiments with pop form. Many of these songs helped lay the groundwork for Magpie and the compositional system that emerged from it, particularly through their use of limited harmonic fields, structures that make use of juxtaposition to drive form, and genre experimentation. The collection spans relatively direct pop songs (such as Down Down, Street Magic, and More) as well as more formally complex works with expanded sound worlds (First Wife, Bee Hive, and Icarus).

While I’m proud of each piece in this collection, I’d like to call specific attention to Two Bird / Speak of the Devil, First Wife, Bee Hive, and Icarus as they represent my attempts to push my compositional boundaries into new territories, as well as strong examples of my work in merging traditional instruments with electronics.