Looks Like Rain
I always loved the Grateful Dead while growing up. Jerry’s lines often dawdled about in brilliant ways always feeling unattached yet somehow connected on an organic way.
Obviously, the Dead had their hits. However, they had quite a few songs that were under the pop radar. Looks Like Rain is one of those. It was often played brilliantly in concert yet often seemed to be one of those chill-out songs that people often went to the vendors when it was playing.
Our version of the song is pretty chilled out, much like the original. Jeremy’s keys glide through the song alongside Neil’s quietly intense drum line.
Note about last week’s song, Red Rain. I have to apologize for the mixdown of Red Rain last week. I remixed the song properly this week and reposted it in the same place. Please give it another listen to hear the difference.
10.28.08Red Rain
Peter Gabriel’s 1987 album, So, was a huge influence on me at the time. It’s the first album I remember truly loving from beginning to finish. “Sledgehammer” was all over MTV at the time and was a critically acclaimed video, but one of the key songs for me was always “Red Rain”.
In an attempt to present the lyrics in a different light, we played the song in a more aggressive manner here. The lyrics speak towards violent subject manner so, we just presented that in this piece in a different way.
Musically, Jeremy’s keyboards are providing the trip-hop rhythm here with Neil providing textural complexity with doumbek percussion work.
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Gun Street Girl
Tom Waits has always been a favorite lyricist fo mine for quite awhile. Part of his draw is due to his unique voice, which always has that desperate “lived-in” sound that is either really appealing or completely revolting, depending on how you feel at the moment you hear him. The other part of his draw, for me, is the way he paints a situation. Many of Waits’ songs, if read one line at a time, sound utterly ridiculous and pointless. However, when heard in succession, along with the odd characters of sound playing with him, it describes an interesting moment in time.
Gun Street Girl is a perfect example of this, in which many of the lines may not make sense out of context but the way Waits’ describes things makes it feel you understand and have been there anyway.
Additionally, this is a unique song for us as Bob joins us on the drums and Neil is playing bass. Together they form a solid walking feel with Jeremy’s atmospheric keywork in a way that Waits’ words could simply just be spoken in an almost matter-of-fact style over top.
09.30.08High Lonesome
The last couple of weeks, we’ve been trying something a bit new with the project. Rather than trying to always come up with lyrics on-the-fly as I’ve been doing, I thought it’d be interesting if we used lyrics from songs that we really enjoy.
So basically, it’s like we’re doing covers, however, we make no attempt at trying to make the music actually sound like the original songs. In fact, often most members of the project have never heard the original songs, which works well as they have no attachment to the original material and we can come up with something entirely original to work with the lyrics.
This week, we have a song called “High Lonesome” from The Gaslight Anthem. It’s a pretty recent band, that I’ve really been listening to a lot and I loved the lyrics. Jim came by last weekend to jam with us and I thought it would work perfectly to fit the lyrics along with his banjo work. Check it out and please feel free to post your thoughts. Thanks.
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