I heard about the RPM challenge a few years ago view All Songs Considered, the NPR music show. The host of All Songs does the challenge every year, and Son Lux’s most recent album was composed this way. The challenge is to record an album of new material  during the month of February. I’m happy to announce that Mons La Hire is doing the challenge. We’ve got a ways to go, but have solid starts for about 5 songs. We’re excited to share the album with you at the end of the month!

The album will be a concept album in a way, but only in process, not in theme. The lyrics are to be a collage – snippets from books and newspapers and magazines I’ll be gathering through the month. Suggestions for books to include are very welcome. I’ve included bits of these books so far:

• A Moveable Feast – Hemingway
• The House at Pooh Corner – Milne
• Holes – Sachar
• The Giver – Lowry
• Death Comes for the Archbishop – Cather
• The Drunkards Walk – Mlodinow
• Being Good – Yun
• The rubu’iyat of Omar Khayyam 
• Confessions of St. Augustine
• Fahrenheit 451 – Bradbury
• Life of Pi – Martel
• New York Times, 2/2/12
• The Bridge of San Luis Rey – Wilder
• Horoscopes for the Dead – Collins
• Good Poems for Hard Times – Keillor (ed.)
• Alan Mendelssohn, the Boy from Mars – Pinkwater

I’ve been cutting up a pile of old National Geographics and Time Magazines to make collages for the artwork. I can’t promise that part will be done at the same time as the music, but I’m aiming for that.

Expect a lot of fuzz guitar. Quite possibly a pile of weird noises. But definitely some catchy tunes!