Matt Mepham and Mike Vasas

September, 2001

Work began on 451 probably about two months after I released The Lessons We Have Learned. It wasn't a clear defined move, though. I continued recording all sorts of different stuff my freshman year, which included finishing off some of the tracks from Lessons... and all sorts of other stuff that never was released. I was doing folk-pop stuff, IDM songs, and working on proggy synth-rock stuff, and I vaguely remember talking to Matt on the phone about working up new material for a record in the summer. We somehow got on the subject of recording a concept record based on a book.

Honestly, we may have been talking about Ray Bradbury's book and then the idea to work on it as a concept record may have come second, I have no idea. Whatever was the real story, I applied some of these tunes to the initial songs. I guess the first four were recorded in Kalamazoo. Once we got home for the summer, we worked on all sorts of different songs for the record. At that point we wrote most of the music first and then I figured out a melody and lyrics that could fit with it later. Connected it with the story and then continued to rework ideas and motifs. I became obsessed with cross-referenced musical ideas during the making of this record because I was really into Wagner at the time. Really, as with most of my "interests" on a record, I end up actually doing a better job solidifying obsessions on the following record, and this was definitely true with the leitmotifs idea. I did a far better job with cross referencing ideas in Bad Luck then I did on 451. The obsession did lend itself well to the final song on the record where I start to sum up ideas and filter it into my interpretation of the story.