from the other blog
Song of the Week III: Week 1
I guess I should write something about this before Week 2 turns to, like, Week 18.
Song of the Week was something I did from about 2008 to 2010. Total I did 70 songs (in 104 weeks— don’t think about that too hard). I stopped when I got too busy with school and work, and because I didn’t feel like I could move the project forward. I wanted the songs to be more ambitious & more polished, and at that point I didn’t have the time/money/tools to really get there.
Since then I’ve kept recording, mostly score for my movies and a few demos that (with one exception) mainly served to clutter my hard drive. There’s a great theory that musicians have to reinvent themselves every three years or risk becoming irrelevant. I haven’t made anything in three and a half years.
That realization and a recent birthday (I’m 24, or retirement age in musician years) have suggested maybe I should be working harder on this shit. I have even less money but a lot more time, and we all know how big of a tool I am.
…
On to the song itself: I was a little wary about coming back with a cover, but this song seemed so ridiculously appropriate that I thought I could get away with it. It’s a little messy and really rusty— you can tell I haven’t spent a lot of time setting up mics in the last few years, and some of the instrumental tracks don’t lock in like they should— but there’s something I really like here, even if only as a blueprint. The lead vocal is maybe the best I’ve done, I finally got to use one those stupid harmonicas I’ve had forever, and it actually feels like it adds something to the original song. Going from rock-gospel to folk-blues isn’t exactly a difficult translation to make, but it still feels like enough of a change that it has a reason to exist, but not so much that it totally misses the point of the original, which are sort of the Scylla and Charybdis of cover songs. Following in the footsteps of the real U2, I’m going to try a different arrangement of this, possibly sooner than you might guess.
OK, credit where it’s due: this song choice was partially inspired by U Talkin’ U2 to Me.
[I don't expect to post any future installments here, but you can follow them on my new blog. It doesn't have title but it's till better because it has a picture of a cat.]
