2045 (Kaden Walsh Album)

**2045** is the fifth studio album by Irish recording Artist Kaden Walsh. Released on October 28, 2002, by Prism Records. It became his second album to be recorded alongside his band simply prefixed as "The Band". With this release Walsh was jutted into Worldwide fame much rather than the fame and recognition he was receiving across Europe, Australia and Asian countries.

*2045* was based on a scientific article that Walsh read about the world coming to an end within the same year, which hugely inspired him at the time during recording. During which Walsh spent six months recording, becoming his fastest recorded at the time, before Closed (2016) which was recorded in two months and four years before the albums launch. The album spawned five Top 10 singles across the world and became one of his best selling albums of all time.

## Artwork

The artwork features the Milky way Galaxy and the like of Walsh's name alongside the album title, in the booklet of the CD, Walsh simply states on the first page alongside a continuation of the galaxy: "The world is about to end, but we won't know it, because while we'll be long gone, in a galaxy that is just as silent as we now are, we will be nothing but a shiny glimmer of sparkle among a galaxy of wondrous stars."

## Release

*2045* was released on October 28, 2002 by Prism Records. It was the fifth studio album released by Walsh. It became Walsh's First album to not debut in the Top 10 of the US Billboard 200 after initial projections had stated that the album would be topping the US Charts. The album however, charted in the Top 5 in various other worldwide countries, except for Japan where it charted at Number 16. In the UK, the album went onto sell 8.5 Million copies which had the album sitting as the best selling album in the UK of all time. Many musical analysts had stated that had the UK introduced Diamond albums, the album '...would have gone 9x Diamond at this point'

## Background

Having been deeply affected by the likes of Aaliyah's passing, Walsh no longer wanted to have any part of being in Abbey Road Studios, or Manhattan Centre to record any future album due to the heavy memories associated with Aaliyah at that point in time. However, having conversed with her during the studio sessions the two had at Manhattan Centre, Walsh found out that during the time, Haughton had recorded part of "What If" down at Sing Sing Studios in Melbourne, which had Walsh's interest with how the vocals were done.

Though openly painful during the time, Walsh openly did not record any form of an album from the likes of July-December of 2001 and just finished off any and all unreleased recordings that were done for the *Forsaken* (2001) era at the time. Many close friends around him at the time had stated that Walsh had become '...a complete recluse' at the time due to her passing and usually spent time with himself and his own thoughts at the production board. Production for the unreleased tracks of Forsaken were rumoured to be completed in October of 2001 with statements about how he would typically sleep within the studio for four hours before getting up and working again.

Initial work on the album started in January of 2002 where Walsh would often spend time in a hotel close by in Melbourne and would do nothing but write songs over the next couple of months, Walsh would have many initial tracks done by the time the initial framing of the album was done, however, would not have any album tracks complete until such time as May of the same year due to difficulty of album track consideration. Production of the initial track singles would be mainly completed within the month of April, July and August. The songwriting and production would however, be done during the months of January through to March, May through to July of the very same year.

The albums initial themes would consist of Walsh's thoughts during and after the Passing of Aaliyah, heartbreak, grief and depression as well as additional, outside themes that were used including the well documented case of a scientific study by Kurzwell that the world was slated to end in 2045 which was dated all the way back to 1990. Walsh began to be further inspired by the likes of, stating that in the lyrics, the only year of peace to be found was that in the year '2044'. Though themes of sex were also used in the album's tracks, the lyricism was a lot more subtle compared to that of Walsh's previous work in *Forsaken* (2001) and *Justice* (2000).

## Track Listing

All Songs written by Walsh, unless stated otherwise

## Personnel

* Kaden Walsh - lead vocals, backgrounds and guitar, Atmos Mixing, Engineering
* Linda Thomsen - Keyboards, co-lead vocals keyboard and background vocals
* Doug Fenton - keyboards
* Aaron Haynes - bass
* Louis Collins - bass
* Rowan O'Downey - drums
* Max Gaffney - Percussion