History is hard on the heart

As I am archiving these song tapes, it's getting a bit rough on me. I had the habit at the time of playing the skeleton of the song I was working on and then just letting the tape roll to pick up what was going on around me while I was writing. I would also narrate the events of my days and capture friends and family in the process. So now as I listen back to these tapes so many years later, there are ghosts of my past coming back to life. Funny how joy can turn to regret with the passing of years. But these songs, if ever properly recorded, will never be now what they were meant to be then and I guess I'm just a reflection of that same fact.

What goes on

Ok - it's been awhile, but remember, there's no promise of productivity here, just an archive that is building organically. So what's been going on during all the silence? Primarily a huge archiving project. I am in the process of transferring 35 cassettes with somewhere near 300 song demos onto Pro Tools. It's a huge project that'll require many passes. Eventually some of these songs will be developed into final, finished versions.

I've been saying to musician friends lately who are aware of the project that I always meant to return to these songs - I just didn't realize it would be (in some cases) 30 years later!

I'll try not to neglect the posting of demos for too much longer, but in case you were wondering, that's what goes on...

"Sound on Sound" 1978 - Tracks 4,5,6 - "All That Matters", "She Doesn't Seem To Be That Nice of Girl", "Diana"

Here's a group of songs, two of which were re-recorded for 2005's "Air Canada" session. Across these three songs, I think I turned a little corner in my young songwriting career.

"All That Matters" was this really simple 4-chord tune, but had this marvelous asymetrical hook that used two chords and built up the tension really nicely.

"She Doesn't Seem To Be That Nice Of Girl" was my attempt at a "Hard Days Night" era Beatles tune, with a swinging groove and very forward melody. It's clean and simple and rockin' and a tune I still like a lot.

"Diana" is a song I really should treat properly one day. It's another piece of pretty good songwriting, with multiple movements that don't seem so different on the surface, but accomplish that Roy Orbison trick of slight, continuous variation from top to tail of the tape.

You'll notice the sound getting "hissier" as I add more instruments and vocals on the tape. I was starting to push to see how much I could add without losing the whole sound of the songs at this point. Something else I always loved about these sesssions was the sound of the Hofner bass (a Beatle-bass), which you can still hear pretty clearly on "All That Matters". When I re-recorded the song for "Air Canada" I tried to re-create the sound with a Fender Percision, and the bass just dominates the mix as a result.

I hope you enjoy these three from the "Sound on Sound" sessions.

Download "All That Matters"

Download "She Doesn't Seem To Be That Nice Of Girl"

Download "Diana"

(right click the link above and "Save Target As..." to your local machine)

"Sound on Sound" 1978 - Track 3: "Everytime (Jill's Song)"

I was crazy about Jill Utz. I think I was probably crazy about her for three years. But I was one of those outsider types in high school, and Jill was definitely "in-crowd" material, so nothing ever came of it but a sweet friendship that I still treasure. I lost touch with Jill right after high school and always wonder what happened to her. I remember hearing she married her high school boyfriend and I think had one of those happily ever after lives that good souls deserve so much. I certainly hope that was the case.

"Everytime (Jill's Song)" is actually a pretty good piece of song craft, and still holds up today to my ears. It has a nice groove and round to it, appropriately sentimental lyrics, and that gentle 70's-ness quality now known as "smooth". It remains one of my favorite songs I've ever written.

When working on the "Air Canada" sessions, I revisited the "Sound on Sound" tape and this was one of the tracks that I refreshed and recorded properly. I gave it a nice "Daniel"-esque feel with electric pianos and synths and am pretty happy with the version. You can pick it up on iTunes if you want, or hear it at the Throttle Body m/c website.

Download "Everytime (Jill's Song)"
(right click the link above and "Save Target As..." to your local machine)

"Sound on Sound" 1978 - Track 2: "Together"

The "Sound on Sound" session was created in the order it appears here, one track after the other. In some cases, like this one, I had a backing track that I had previously recorded, and simply made a few additions to it. "Together" features Lenny Dahlstrom on guitar and backing vocals, as well as Thom Brisendine on backing vocals. The backing track was recorded at my best friend Paul Ralph's basement and the only addition I made for this version was the bass guitar. Lenny was a cool guitar player who knew how to rock in the old-school "rock and roll" kind of way and his playing made a number of these tunes come to life.

Download "Together"
(right click the link above and "Save Target As..." to your local machine)

"Sound on Sound 1978" - Track 1: "Besides Love You"

In 1978 I was a Junior in High School in Federal Way, WA and was writing a lot of songs, all of which I was certain were hits. In retrospect of course, some of them were actually pretty good and some of them were horrible.

In those days, other than large-scale recording studios like Bear Creek in Woodinville and some downtown Seattle ones who's names now esacpe me (one even partially owned by Heart!), the options for the young artist were only a couple - TASCAM or OTARI. Both companies made 4 and 8 track home multi-track machines, neither of which I could afford, being in the multi-thousand dollar price range.

What I could afford to do was trick a casette recorder into being a multi-track. If I recall the process, I would record a signal into, say the left stereo channel, then I would send the output of that channel to the right channel while I recorded a new part with it. This process could survive maybe 4-5 overdubs before the whole track was lost in hiss, but it was my first stab at making my own recordings and I remember having fun despite the noise of the tape. I was never good in those days at saturating the signal - it was always on the weak side - and that meant even more tape hiss!

But I WAS making recordings. I was following the footsteps of my heros. In my basement I had my own Abby Road and I was George Martin AND The Beatles all at once.

So, from 30 years ago, in a long, narrow basement room with no windows where a kid sat for hours plucking out tunes on a 1956 Gibson ES225, a Hofner violin bass, an Ibaznez Performer and cardboard boxes that served as drums; here's the first of the "Sound on Sound' sessions - a little offering I called, "Besides Love You".

Download "Besides Love You"
(right click the link above and "Save Target As..." to your local machine)

Living the dream - "Freebird" LIVE, 1978

When I was in high school, if you were a musician, there was one song you better know how to play if you wanted to be cool. That song, was "Freebird" by Lynrd Skynrd. At Decatur HS in 1978, the song was selected as the Homecoming theme. A good friend, and graduate, Bob Neal, returned to play guitar with us Seniors, and he was joined by Jerry Luckenback, a local "he can really play" legend on another solo guitar. Jerry was a "real" musician. He had played in a bar or two. He was over 21. We were impressed. He smoked and everything.

The rest of the band I can almost entirely remember...Brian (Last name escapes me) on drums, Paul Ralph, my best friend, on Rickenbacker 4001 bass, and Lenny Dahlstrom on guitar and vocals. I was the keyboard player. you can hear me early on on piano and later on electric piano (a real Fender Rhoads 88), actually not tearing it up too badly considering we never had a rehearsal.

It's a joke today to call out requests at shows of any size, and usually someone yells, "Freebird!" But in 1978...I was livin the dream, baby!

If you were at Decatur High School in Federal Way, WA between 1976 and 1981, this one's for you.

Download "Freebird"
(right click this link and "Save Target As..." to your local machine)