While most of us rushed and stammered to record one RPM album in February, AE Bridger — recently voted “Most Original Songwriter in Town” — slapped 7 together. Seven albums in a month.

“I was up late a lot yeah. Typical day was 3:30 pm rise, 4pm start, 5-6am sleep, repeat. I did not work in February so I was recording music full time.”

Bridger also spent all of January recording his own songs in Montreal. “I was putting in like 20+ hours a week, so I felt that I was a bit out of juice for RPM. I used that as an incentive to focus on collaborating with as many people as possible and share stuff that inspired me. This resulted in 7 new records, all of which I learned something from.”

Here are links to those 7 collaborations, and a little spiel on each:

Justin Strong’s Peace and Understanding
http://justinstrong.bandcamp.com/releases

Gospel, classic pop, soul and hip hop are all represented here. Justin trusts me a lot, and gave me a lot of freedom as engineer and producer in bringing his neo-soul meditations to life. Key concepts were “clarity,” “euphoria” and “honesty.”

No Culture’s River Post Motion
http://patrickcanning.bandcamp.com/releases

Production on this one started first and finished last. Nothing was pre-meditated or discussed; me and Pat Canning quite literally hit record and let the sounds decide where it went. It ended up being the folkiest thing I’ve ever touched, maybe like David Lynch meets The Pogues meets Mount Eerie.

Literary Sensation Iain McCurdy
http://literarysensationiainmccurdy.bandcamp.com/releases

Iain brought me acapella readings of his extended poems, bookended with acoustic guitar interludes. These bookends provided all the harmonic content needed to fill the negative space, so I branched off with drums, mandolin and accordion. Quick and intuitive, like a weirder Astral Weeks.

AE Bridger’s Thought Mansion Sessions
http://aebridger.bandcamp.com/releases

This has most of St John’s best rappers (Dopepiece, Joseph from Chessclub, Moyst, G-Smooth) rapping over instrumentals performed by me, with extended avant-garde jazz saxophone sections by Chris McGee, who plays with me all the time. It sounds pretty much like what you’d expect given that description.

Maudite Incantation’s Escape from Thought Mansion and Turiya
http://mauditeincantation.bandcamp.com/releases

Mangalore B and I had rehearsed this style of ambient music for most of the fall, so capturing it was pretty easy. It took less time to record these than it does to listen to them, as parts were slowed down in post production. These are the ones I listen to the most, as they are useful for meditating, stimulating positive creativity, and protection from unwanted spiritual involvement.

Deep Soul Skeets’ Horror
http://deepsoulskeets.bandcamp.com/releases

This was recorded on the 29th on the extra day we had this year in February. These black metal inspired songs were written by Michelle LaCour who has produced the next two records I’m trying to release in the coming years. It’s the only one I did that was mainly driven by guitar, which is my main instrument. Sounds kind of like the Burzum records Varg did in prison.