Fool On The Hill

In the spring, I was questioned for two hours at the border crossing. They seemed to have a hard time believing I was going to go home again in six weeks like I said. This was my first crossing with the Nexus 'trusted traveler' card, so it was a huge and stressful surprise to me. In hindsight, I did have a ton of needless crap in the car, so maybe it did look like I was pulling up stakes. Anyway after finally calling my boss to corroborate my story, they let me in. Phew!

The two other big events on that trip were pro demo recording sessions at Parlor for This Old House and at Beaird for Move Mountains.

Matt Legge engineered and mixed This Old House. We hung around for a while, 'chewing the fat' as they say back home or 'shooting the breeze' they'd say elsewhere. He mentioned Sam Hawksley, a writer-producer friend of his who he thought I should meet. Only trouble was I was heading back to Toronto a couple days later.

We kept in touch and I timed my next trip to coincide with some album sessions that Matt and Sam had scheduled in July.

So I rolled into town again July 7, planning to stay for just two weeks. I decided to give up the 6-8-week visits partly because they seemed to cause undue suspicion at the border and also because it was hard being away from loved ones back home.

Matt invited me to hang out and listen to the sessions they were doing at Fool On The Hill for Nina Ferro's upcoming record. I listened while the five-piece band recorded two songs with Nina singing in an iso booth. Great songs, great band and a great voice!

Back up a few hours: it was Friday morning and I'd been in town five days. Up to that point, I didn't  have any plans to record. But following an NSAI mentoring meeting with Candi Carpenter, I decided I wanted to record a couple of simple acoustic versions of two of my not-so-country songs.

The mentoring sessions are an hour and mine with Candi was supposed to be Thursday morning. But the NSAI schedule got mixed up and she never knew about it. So she came in Friday just to hang out with me because she'd be on tour up north the following week and we wouldn't have another chance. We ended up spending around two hours talking and playing music.

Candi got excited about Move Mountains and This Old House. But when I told her I didn't have much similar country stuff, she said it'd be tricky approaching publishers with only two solid country demos. Although I might be hoping for a single-song deal to get things started, that wasn't necessarily how they'd be thinking.  Typically, they want to know that a new writer has a lot of stuff in the ballpark and the potential to regularly churn out a lot more stuff, including hits. Anyhoodles, I said I had some other stuff that I wondered about.

So I pulled out my guitar and played What About The Grey and Any Other Lover. In both cases, Candi was humming along harmonies pretty quickly and her positive feedback was incredible. It's funny how I'd discounted these songs because they didn't feel 'country' to me, even though I loved them. What About The Grey was about six years old, with an occasional edit in the meantime; and Any Other Lover was about two weeks old. Thinking of it now, it's interesting that they both started with guitar parts before lyrics (unusual bits for me that came from just fooling around, not intending to write anything) and out of emotion vs an objective hook-driven process.

Following that great meeting, I went to the studio to meet Matt and told him I was thinking of recording a couple of songs. He said "you need a guitarist?" and pointed through the studio window at Sam. I said hells yeah. So we lined up a session for the following Friday.

Sam would play acoustic and I'd sing. Nothing fancy. Candi had said she'd sing harmonies for me if she got back in town in time for the session, but it turned out she wouldn't. So she recommended Kenzie Wetz, a friend of hers and a great singer and musician.

I had another NSAI mentoring session the following Monday with Roger Alan Nichols and started right in with these and a couple other 'non-country' songs for his feedback. He loved them too! Roger really dug into the nitty gritty of the lyrics more so than Candi had. He had some great points about What About The Grey. A couple lines didn't really stick to the rhyme scheme. I'd hemmed and hawed over them through the years but liked the way they sounded, even though they clearly didn't rhyme. In hindsight, if I'm being honest, it was pure laziness that I didn't change them. Roger said "Publishers hear so many songs that they're just waiting for a reason to say no. When the brain's expecting a rhyme before the first chorus and you don't deliver, that's the reason to say no." So I sat down to fix them before the recording session and it didn't really take very long once I set my mind to it.

That Wednesday I met Matt at a pub to watch a soccer match and Sam came 'round too. We never got to talk much at Nina's session because they were working their butts off. So it was good to just hang out and get acquainted.

Matt setting up the session and Sam making loops

Come Friday, I showed up at the studio around 1:00 for a 1:15 start. Sam was already crouched over his laptop, programming a drum loop to one of the soundcloud links I'd sent.

We started with What About The Grey. Sam was on acoustic in one iso booth and I was singing in another. There was a window between us and we both had big windows into the control room where Matt was at the helm. We ran through it a couple times till we found a comfy tempo.

Sam had a solid guitar part after two takes and then added another part with a different guitar. I sang the whole way through each pass and we took the best bits from each to make a whole lead vocal part. Most of the bits came from one take, which I find is usually the case.

Sam playing 2nd acoustic for What About The Grey

Then we ran though the same process with Every Other Lover. The way Sam approached the first song had a bit of a different vibe than my original, but his take on this one was even more different – almost a reggae undertone, which was pretty cool. Sam is a fabulous guitar player – totally uninhibited by genre or style. He was playing electric R&B and soul last Friday and now he was playing reggae-infused acoustic folk rock.

Kenzi showed up on time for her vocal session and hung around patiently while we finished up the last acoustic track.

While Matt set up the booth for her, we ran the songs a couple times in the control room. She jumped right in and sounded so incredibly natural that I couldn't contain the smiles. What a beautiful voice, and we really mixed well.

I didn't have much in the way of concrete ideas for the harmonies, so I just figured we'd let her do whatever came natural and see what else popped up along the way.

Matt was great for this part of the process – not only engineering and keeping track of various parts of multiple takes, but helping me articulate my ideas and throwing in some of the best ones himself. We bounced a bunch of ideas around and Kenzie was great about trying anything and letting us know what she thought. All in all, easy as pie.

After that, Sam started setting up his electric gear. This was an awesome addition because I'd come into the studio only expecting acoustic tracks – and they were already sounding great. Matt said, "That's just how he rolls, man." They both seemed really into the tunes, which was the cherry on top from my perspective. They work on so much great music in the run of a day – it's a cool feeling to know they're digging your stuff.

While they were setting up, I took lunch orders and headed out to Firehouse Subs just out around the corner. By the time I got back, they were starting electric guitar parts on the second song. I didn't even hear the electric tracks for the first song until the end and we were eating sandwiches! But they were great and I had nothing to change.

Then I helped Sam load his car, Matt gave me rough mixes and we were all on our way again. What a great finale to the visit, making music with some wonderfully creative people.

For all the positive vibes this trip, thank you Candi, Roger, Matt, Sam and Kenzie.

Granny Smith vs Royal Gala

For the sake of comparison...


Move Mountains

Work tape

Demo




This Old House

Work tape


Demo





 

Move Mountains

One of my goals for this trip was to make a professional Nashville studio demo. On past visits, I’d gotten tips from the NSAI gang and a couple other folks around town about Beaird Music so, with about a week and a half left to go, I gave them a call.

Shortly thereafter, I went to an NSAI pitch to publisher night and had a bit of a meltdown, but that’s different story. For now, I’ll just say that I nearly backed out of the recording session. But after a long chat with my buddy Alex back in Toronto on Friday the 19th and more pondering over the weekend, I decided to go ahead. But I switched songs from This Old House to Move Mountains, because I thought it more closely followed ‘the rules’ of what and where the hook should be. A big part of why I wanted to do the demo was for the pure experience of it. But, if I walked out of it with a great recording of a song I wasn’t necessarily confident in, then I just wouldn’t feel good about the money side of it – it’d be more of an expense than an investment.

On the Sunday, my buddy Keefer in Nashville told me about a ‘starving artist’ session that Parlor Productions does about once a month where they’ll do a pro recording for a low rate per song and give you the raw files to mix yourself. So, I pondered that and ended up doing This Old House there. But when I heard what band was doing with it on the floor, I decided there was no way I was going to wreck it by mixing the tune myself! So I did the full meal deal with them and couldn’t be happier. I wrote about that session here.

On Tuesday afternoon, I met with producer Larry Beaird. He gave me a tour and we chatted a bit about what I was up to. He pulled out a note pad and pencil and clicked play on his laptop. My work tape started playing and he wrote out the chords without missing a beat. Part way through verse two, he stopped it and said, “now, that’s different than the first verse,” to which I replied “no, it’s the same.” But he was right, it was different. I was playing a Bm in the spot where a D had been in verse 1. Maybe I played the mistake or I might have edited it, but I still didn’t notice it myself! The melody works over both. Larry said, “either way is fine, I just want to make sure I chart it right.” I asked for a guitar and played it for him. So, verse 2 music stayed the same as verse 1 music. But it was pretty funny that I didn’t even notice the mistake in my own recording!

He finished the chart and asked what I wanted to do for an intro. In my recording, the stong starts with vox and guitar right on the first word. I wanted a little musical intro though, perhaps with a melodic theme that could carry forward into breaks and and outro.

I said “here’s what I usually do when I play it live” and played a 1 5  /  1 1 4 5 progression. He asked me for the guitar and said “yeah, that’s one way, here’s another.” He played the same chords but with different timing. Then he said “or this might be nice” and played something slightly different again while humming part of my hook melody over it. I wish I’d had a video going for this process like I did with the Parlor session that morning (by the way, thanks to my buddy Gabe for grabbing my iPhone and shooting that stuff!).

So we agreed on that for the intro and a variation before verse 2 and another for the outro. He made a few extra scribbles on the pad and I think through the whole process, might’ve use the eraser once. Then he said “alright, let’s play it” and he played guitar while I sang.

The final chart was finished in about 15-20 minutes.

When I went back to the studio Friday morning, all the musicians were set up and ready to go. I’m not sure if they recorded something else before my song or if they keep their gear set up there all the time. Anyway, they all joined Larry, me and Jim the Engineer in the control room and we listened to my work tape twice with a little talk in between about the new intro and a slight tempo increase overall.

L-R: Howard Duck (piano), Eli Beaird (bass), me, Larry Beaird (acoustic guitar), Jim DeBlanc (tracking engineer), Danny Parks (electric guitar), Scotty Sanders (steel guitar), Greg Morrow (drums)

Then they scattered into various isolation rooms. Drums and bass were to the left, clearly visible in a big window about 6 feet long by room height. Larry was on acoustic on the other side of a window right in front of the sound board. Keys, electric and steel were in another room to the right, also with a large window. I sang the scratch vocal in the control room with Jim.

We played through once and made a little change to the intro. I asked what they thought about speeding it up a couple more clicks. Larry said “Well, let’s have a listen. Let’s play the chorus boys.” Jim had the click track already set and Greg counted it in. When they stopped, Greg said “well, it didn’t hurt it.” It felt good to me singing at that speed and there was a cool new energy to the song. So that’s the tempo we kept.

They recorded two passes and we kept the second one to work with. Bass and drums were finished. Howard wanted to do his piano part again and then recorded an organ part. Danny wanted to redo the electric track and then add some layers. He and Scotty also worked out the outro riffs together. I think it was all said and done in less than a half hour.

I went back after lunch to meet Matt Dame for the vocal session. Just like he’d done on Tuesday for This Old House at Parlor, he listened to the band with my scratch vocal and made little chicken scratches over each line on the lyric sheet. He had two listens and then went into the booth.

I asked Jim if Larry was going to join in and he said no. I have to admit I got a bit nervous! On Tuesday, Larry Sheridan, the producer at Parlor, had produced the vocal session as well as the band. Today at Beaird, I had to direct Matt on my own. I certainly wasn’t as articulate as any of the Nashville Larries, but I got through it. And Jim was a great help bouncing ideas around. Matt did one loose run through and then two solid passes. Then we talked about a few things I wanted to change, subtle timing on a couple of words and a melody I wanted to repeat in the first two lines of the chorus.

He sang everything just a little bit different than I had and it was great. So much fun to hear him put a nice little southern twist on my lyrics. When we had the lead, he very quickly laid down a harmony part and we were done.

I went to the office and made sure all my paperwork was sorted. It was nearly 4:00 by then, so Tytus the studio manager said they’d email me a mix on Wednesday. I finished packing and hit the highway, northbound for home.

The mix (by Dave Buchanan) was in my email the following Wednesday as promised and I’m 100% happy with it. I just asked for another version with the vocal a touch louder to cover my bases for pitch purposes.

My arse and The Brink

I'm cutting a 2nd demo tomorrow. This time at Beaird Music, tracking in the morning and vocals in the afternoon. Then I hop in the car and start the long drive home again. Looking forward to the other end of the road.

I wrote "The Brink" a week or so ago -- started it one night while driving back from a friend's place in Hermitage, just east of Nashville. Which gets me thinking about serendipity...

I wouldn't have written this song if I hadn't:

1. Gotten off my arse one sluggish eve and gone to hear the rounds at Belcourt Taps
2. Talked to a writer there about one of the songs she played
3. Exchanged contact info
4. Gotten an invite from her to play a round a few days later
5. Talked to her and her husband again that 2nd night
6. Gotten invited to a BBQ at their place that weekend
7. Been driving back from the BBQ on highway 40, which got me thinking of the upcoming drive home to Canada and seeing my girlfriend again after 6 weeks.

To paraphrase: I wouldn't have written this song if I hadn’t gotten off my arse.

And... thanks to Ashley and Brent for the hospitality and the amazing food and home brew!

Pinky toe in the awesome ocean

I arrived at Parlor Productions around 9:30 yesterday morning as some of the session players were chatting in the parking lot before load in. Producer and co-owner Larry Sheridan gave me a tour of the studio and introduced me to everybody as they set up.

By 10:10, the band was ready and all the players came into the control room to review the chart that band leader and co-owner Robin Ruddy had prepared the night before. Larry said he and Robin had an idea to change my chromatic walk-down so the music didn’t follow the vocal melody but instead supported it, and give the song a more contemporary feel.

He played my ‘work tape’ (guitar-vocal home demo) long enough for the group to hear the part he was talking about. Then there were ideas bouncing around left, right and center; all spoken in the Nashville number system, which I understand on the most basic level. But what I know of it is kind of like grade four French: je vais, tu vas, nous allons, discotheque... But these folks were in speaking their mother tongue. I knew what they were talking about, but I wasn't keeping up with the conversation!

Once they reached their conclusion, the guitarist played it for me to sing along with and I agreed it was a great idea. There were now three chords instead of my original four, and an Em that I hadn’t played there before. A little change, but it made such a huge difference, especially to me since my old way is kind of carved into the brick that holds my head together.

Then the band went back to the live room and got set to run it. Drums, bass and electric were in the main room. Keyboards were in an isolation booth, acoustic guitar in another iso, and I was in a third to sing the scratch vocal. The pro singer would be in the following day.



Here’s the team:

Bass: Spady Brannan
Drums: Mark Beckett
Keys: Jimmy Nichols
Electric: Kerry Marx
Acoustic: Robin Ruddy
Engineer: Matt Legge
Assistant engineer: Micah Tanner
Producer: Larry Sheridan

Band tracking
Larry asked if I wanted to build gradually or start big. I said big and Mark counted it in. There was one hiccup on the bridge and another at the end of the double chorus. But they hadn’t even listened to the whole song at that point, they were just playing from the chart! We talked about those dynamics for a few minutes and how to best support the vocal lines there. Then Larry played those parts of my work tape again for reference.

Take one was done before I knew it and take two followed after a few more comments from Larry on transitions. After that, Kerry, Robin and Spady punched in to tighten up a few bits each. Jimmy punched in for a couple of piano fixes and then added a B3 organ.

I’ve read about and heard oodles of people say “you’ll be amazed” at the level of professionalism and musicianship in Nashville. But it’s an entirely different thing to experience it first hand with your own song.

Vocals
By 10:45, the band was done and I was chatting with Robin about the singer she booked. I didn't have time to hear any samples or choose anyone because the booking came together pretty last minute. So it's pretty cool that she unknowingly got the same guy I'd already booked for Friday on another song at another studio!

Singing the scratch track along with the band felt like a surreal karaoke experience. But listening to someone else record the real vocal was whacky on a whole other level.

I'm by no means a great guitarist, so it wasn’t so strange to hear somebody play it better than me. But I consider myself a singer, and these lyrics have only ever been sung by me. I think that’s the biggest part of it. Although I’ve edited them a fair bit for commercial pitching since I wrote the first version for my parents’ anniversary years ago, they’re still quite personal. And I’ve never heard anyone else sing them. So it was pretty whacky to hear Matt Dame sing everything just a little bit different than I do. And the quality and control of his voice is really something else.

When I opened the control room door, he was already making his own custom shorthand notes over each word as yesterday’s rough mix played with my scratch vocal. Vertical bars like numeral ones signified the downbeat. Numbers at the end of a line were for the chord it ended on. And there were all sorts of squiggles that he said couldn’t be explained, but meant something to him.

Parlor Productions, April 24, 2013: Matt Dame singing This Old House by Michael Lake

Once at the microphone, he did one rough pass and we had a quick listen to that with Larry. Then he did two takes and punched in to redo a few lines here and there. Then he added three harmony tracks with absolute ease and precision for every tiny inflection. I guess all those squiggly lines did the trick!

Mix etc
Obviously, as the songwriter, I’m focused on the music and vocals more so than the technology end of things. But I can’t complete the story without sending kudos to Matt Legge the engineer who kept everything rolling while tracking and especially when reviewing takes and editing. He also mixed it. I left the vocal session at 4:40 and popped back around 7:00 for a listen. We made a couple of timing tweaks between the vocals and drums, and softened some P pops. To be honest, I don't know if "we" did that or if "he" did it while I just happened to be there. :-)

Everyone involved was fast, efficient and amazing at what they did. If they weren’t talking precise music theory about the song or recording it, then they were joking around and making it one of the most relaxed atmospheres I’ve ever been in.

So, I know it’s my first toe in the water, but you can definitely add me to the list of people who’ll say you’ll be amazed with the talent and professionalism in Nashville. It truly is something to behold.

My first professional Nashville demo is in the can. Time and money well spent.

First pro demo!

I just booked by first Nashville pro demo session. So stoked! I'll meet producer Larry Beaird on Tuesday to review the chart and production direction. Then we're in the studio with a five-piece band on Friday. This is gonna be the coolest experience.

Too many trucks?

I was laying in bed last night in head-imploding allergy agony. For some reason, I started thinking of all the songs I’d heard on the radio that day with some combination of ‘dirt road’, ‘truck’, ‘tail gate’ and ‘cut off jeans’. I’m trying to put my finger on why those words frustrate me. Is it because I don’t have the specific personal memories to relate? Or because it just feels like too many people are saying the same thing? Not all the lines in all these songs are the same, of course. But those bits and pieces stick out to me and I wonder if they could’ve tried harder on those lyrics; if they’re just filler. But, at the same time, I am listening to those songs on the radio. So, clearly, I’ve something to learn from them!

I started imagining the scenes. Driving off away from the hustle and bustle to be alone in nature with the woman you love. It’s certainly an inviting scene.

Maybe the dirt road and the jean shorts and the truck and the tail gate are the common triggers that country fans and folks from the south and west all remember fondly from their own stories. The rest of the lyrics are the writer’s story, which is widely accessible and friendly, but it’s one person’s story. Maybe that handful of commonly recurring trigger words are the things that bridge the gap between the writer’s/singer’s story and the listener’s own similar stories. Between the song's fantasy and life's reality.

And maybe I’m just sore that I don’t have some of my own teenaged, back-country road snuggle memories. After all, I never had a truck, just borrowed my folks’ K-car occasionally!

Well, wouldn’t you know it, but that allergy headache kept me awake long enough to write two verses and a chorus for my own little back-country road snuggle song. No mention of a truck or dirt road or cutoffs, but there are jeans and t-shirts and boots and trees and grass and beer and water. Some of my own faves. And a girl who I’d one day like to be in the scene with.

And, yeah, I wouldn’t mind having a truck too. :-)

Let Hope Jump First

In June, it was hard to think of much else besides my departure date on the 29th. I'd spend two months in Nashville, working via email during the day for my boss in Toronto, playing as many writers rounds as I could at night, writing and meeting people to co-write with. I was looking forward to the summer journey, knowing that it was also the beginning of a larger and longer one. I was feeling hopeful. Scared too.

On June 15, I wrote "Let Hope Jump First"

Well it’s that little leap of faith
And it’s that little prayer you say
With the first step on your way
To something bigger

When you feel beaten down
Just look inside and not around
There’s something better to be found
If you dig deeper

Yeah, there's a great divide
With all your dreams on the other side

CHORUS
Let hope jump first, you might be surprised
Where it’ll land and how far it flies
Send it on ahead, then follow up behind
Just plant your feet one at a time

Instead of standing still
And worrying what might be the worst
Let hope jump first

Son, I’ve been in your shoes
Hesitated on a move
Terrified that I might lose
But that ain’t playing

Now I know, there's a great divide
And all your dreams are on the other side

REPEAT CHORUS

BRIDGE
With hope, you’re never looking back
It keeps your heartbeat racing fast and forward

REPEAT CHORUS

When I sing the song these days, I sometimes get a little choked up. I'm so thankful for that hook line. It's a constant reminder to keep putting one foot in front of the other. Nasty things may indeed happen along the way, like crashing my bike last June. But we can't let 'the maybes' scare us away from what may be. The good comes with the bad. Proof in the pudding: the weird turn that things took last June lead me to make some great friends in Nashville who are now helping me get things straightened away for future visits.

As I get set for the next one in March, I'm only now nearly recovered from the last visit! After five months of physiotherapy, my wrist is pretty much back to normal. I'm exercising again. Even did a few [modified] push ups this week! I'm happy with the music I've been writing lately. Happier in general. Still not writing as frequently as I'd like, but I'm constantly pondering and making notes. I'm much better at and more comfortable with writing without an instrument, which has definitely helped my lyrical focus and melody lines.

Of course, prepping for 'the move' is eating up a lot of time and energy. I'm moving out of my apartment so I can afford to make more frequent visits to Nashville. When I was there last summer, I paid two rents the whole time. But I can't stay afloat for long like that! There's no set schedule or timing, but I reckon I'll be able to head south every two-three months. I have to be in Canada for certain periods of time to keep my healthcare and auto insurance -- and I sure don't want to lose either of those! For stints on the home front in Toronto, I'll rely on a combination of short-term rentals, friend's guest rooms and hopefully some house-sits to help pinch more pennies. Keep me in mind if you're taking sabbatical!

I've been purging like crazy, giving away books, donating clothes, tossing more useless junk than I care to admit. What's left will go in a storage locker. After that, it's just a duffel bag and guitar for the next year or so. Who knows what'll come of it, but it's gonna be an adventure!

"Instead of standing still
And worrying what might be the worst
Let hope jump first"