LISTEN!: [audio:http://donalkelly.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/GoodTogether.mp3|titles=Good Together]
Another day, another song. This time I returned to Audacity, downloaded the latest version along with the package of plugins and the decoders (to export mp3s). I used Fruityloops to create a basic rhythm track after I had played around with the song structure. I wanted to have a feel of change in the song- I know a lot of my stuff finds a comfortable spot and stays there- this time I wanted a different progression. I ended up with a verse/rhythm section that (I think) contrasts a bit with the chorus, though only using the regular chords in the key of C; no sevenths, and nothing diminished.
It was originally called ‘Broken Shores’, and about self exploration and release, but I wanted a more positive life-affirming message, and a bit of the softheart stuff to bleed into the nonspecific detail.
The original chorus went
And I see way down inside me a place to explore once more
Untie me let me arrive we cannot survive these broken shores
But it was too similar to the verse, so eventually I came up with the idea of being ‘good together,’ realizing that after all the baggage and stress and change, some things are worth fighting for, and that life is illuminated by moments- breaks in the cloud. So the new chorus is
I’ve been feeling inspired by moments in life that push through the heavy weather
and I’ve been hoping to fly been waiting in line I know that we’re good together.
The verse then has its own structural pattern- “when you XXXX you can’t XXXX, ” which seemed strange at first but sounded good to me in lines like
When you leave you can’t leave, Behind the scenes of empty
Where leave is followed by leave behind. As usual I’m not sure exactly what it all means. But knowing what everything means is not the domain of art. Foraging in the darkness and being struck by a flow of creative juice, expressing something intangible, something that touches on or captures, distils or engraves some measure of something that connects to others, Actually I would struggle to conceive of a description of musical art that accounts for everything from the latest billion viewed idol tune to the raging fuel of death metal. I cannot even ennumerate the genres. BUT, again, back to the main direction of the post, being the song, this song, from the latest round of foraging in the ether.
Am F G
When you stop you can’t stop
starting things you can’t drop, over the hill and down again
When you move you can’t move
Till you find your own groove, time to kill, lose to win
C F Am G
And I’ve been feeling inspired by moments in life that push through the heavy weather
and I’ve been hoping to fly been waiting in line I know that we’re good together
When you wait you can’t wait
To get out on your own way, to boldly go to slowly grow
when you fake you can’t fake
the secrets that you won’t take, heart to sleeve, half believe
I’ve been feeling inspired by moments in life that push through the heavy weather
and I’ve been hoping to fly been waiting in line I know that we’re good together
Dm C Am G
What we do when we are doing something new is just a novelty
no matter how she speaks, we we play this game for keeps
When you leave you can’t leave
Behind the scenes of empty
Glasses left on floors unswept
When you hope you can’t hope
For more than you have let go
Your open hand I understand.
we can go through the lists and tick off the things
that we never did and see what we missed and
start a new chapter call it whatever as long we’re good together
I recorded the guitar rhythm track using the fruityloops beat as a metronome, then added vocals, and a few layers of them for the choruses. I went back to FL to fill out the beat, then exported it and imported it into Audacity. A bit of low end comes from another acoustic track with only the E and A strings used- I cut out the highs and boosted the lows with an EQ plugin. I also compressed a little and added some reverb. The short solo uses my Telecaster through a Pod II, I just played and replayed on the same spot on the neck till something sounded half right.
I tried to space everything out in the mix and fill the spectrum more than I normally do After reading Guerrila Home Recording I was more confident using the effects but I tried to err on the side of caution and keep them pretty low, panning them left or right to balance things out.
