I’ve heard of many bands which have fallen into an annual schedule, either intentionally or otherwise.  Just this week I listened to an interview with Lo Moon saying they don’t write much when they tour throughout the year, but they break every Winter to return to Chicago and write.  In late Winter they’ll take the new songs into the studio and turn them into an album. As Dave says, Summers have been a time to recharge for us, but we always hit hard come Fall. Once Ben returned from his Summer tour with the Blue Devils Drum and Bugle Corps we played 4 shows in four weeks between Tennessee and Ohio.  We’ve also been doubling the number of shows we play in a month and plan on keeping that pace moving through the Winter.

In late August once Ben returned we played a short set at The Basement to get the tunes back under our fingers.  The next week we played a full set opening for The Frank Hurd Band[1] at The Local, and it felt good!  After two months doing acoustic shows and writing, it was a good reminder of what we’re capable of when all six of us are on the stage together.  Playing without the full roster is possible, but the full-band dynamic is no comparison: Ben’s bass grooving to Bobby’s beat, Dave and Tim trading guitar solos, and Jordan’s sax singing over my piano.  We followed that show with a set at TN Brew Works: the same two-hour set we used at our show at Buckeye Lake Brewery in Ohio. Dave mentions in the podcast (episode 8) how rewarding it is to have a two-hour set of originals in our repertoire, and he’s right.  Never before have I been in a band with that deep of a catalogue. The frustrating part of having that much music is how little of it is available to listen to yet. Some of our earliest songs, and some of my favorites (“On My Feet,” and “I Know My Name,”) haven’t been recorded anywhere.  And while some of our brand new songs are going on this album, there are some that aren’t, which means the only place they’re going to exist is on the stage for the time being.

Playing these long shows which force us to both expand our catalogue and dig back into the songs we wrote five years ago is a fascinating exercise in self-reflection.  Some aspects of our songwriting have grown or changed tremendously, like the subject and tone of our lyrics. Other characteristics which haven’t changed have become trademarks of our sound.  I’d be surprised if we ever wrote another song like “The Door,” and yet “I Can’t Go” has similarly fluid and beautiful lyrics, and “Out West” has a different harmonic rhythm, but the rhyme scheme is similar and the chord structure beneath it which creates a similar pace to the song.  We’ve said before that we pay more attention to the sound of a song than the sound of the band. Although that still holds true, I don’t think any song has been a departure for us; I don’t listen to any song we’ve written in the past five years with the desire to change something or make it fit our sound more closely.  And as long as those Donkey Kongas get mixed in, I don’t think I ever will.

I hope by now you’ve listened to the closing of the episode to join in our enjoyment of the song’s auxiliary percussion.  Humor aside, this is one of my favorite songs we do partly because it’s a great example of our how Tim, Dave, and I write together.  As he explains in the episode, Tim wrote the song: rhythm, chords, melody[2], and lyrics.  I took his lyrics and created another part echoing them.[3]  

You break my heart, darling, everyday

You break, yeah you break my heart(enough to warrant repeating myself)

It always starts when you’re looking my way.

Don’t you, don’t you look my way(, please, or I’ll have to repeat myself again).

Dave then took my part and saw potential.  Where I saw some space which could be filled sonically, he saw space in the story which could be filled by another voice: another character.  Now the part isn’t merely an echo of Tim’s, it’s another side to the story. When the speaker of the song says “You break my heart, darling, everyday,” now the audience to those words, the song’s second speaker, gets the chance to reply: “[No,] … you break my heart.”  Again, when the first speaker declares, “It always starts when you’re looking my way,” the second voice retorts, “[Then] don’t you...look my way.”  What was previously a monologue is now a dialogue; or at least two monologues which can both be heard by the audience[4] providing a more complete picture.  Where there was once one speaker passing blame, now the song’s subject has the opportunity to say, “but you are equally to blame.  It wasn’t just your heart that was broken. It isn’t just my blame to bear, but yours as well.” I won’t explicate the entire song here,[5] because there is a point to be made.  

The song now has another dimension; it’s more real and more relatable.  What was, at first, a scorned “we’re not together” song[6] is now a complete picture of a relationship.  Things don’t always work out, but there’s not always one person to blame.  Maybe truth is relative. Maybe our memory of a relationship is shaped by our feelings toward it or toward the other person.  The point is, maybe there’s more to the story than we know or we’re willing to admit. This perspective wasn’t accessible to the audience until Dave saw it and brought it to the surface.  The last step in this evolution is Nicki Belsante’s performance of the song, but I won’t do it justice here by talking about it. She can sing for herself.

As we prepare to go back into the studio this weekend to finish the album, a reflection of our recording success is in order.  Back in January The first day of the project was “prolific” in Tim’s words: We tracked 5 songs in under 8 hours, and a large part of that success was due to our engineer, Nick Molino.  The attitude he brought into the control room made it easy to get the tracks down. He made us comfortable enough to try out new ideas, but pushed us to get the highest quality tracks we were capable of.  Bobby remarks in this episode how different this trip to the studio was from our previous recording venture back in 2016. Back then we would spend days rehearsing our seven songs over and over to build stamina and ensure that the parts were tight.  This time the songs were ready on their own. Preparation was previously the key to our recording success, but this time around so was chemistry. Dave says that when we walked into the studio in January everyone took agency and pride in their own work which made a better product.  Ben wasn’t with us when we wrote these songs, but he owns his bass parts and his character shines through them. Likewise, Jordan originally played parts written by Tim, but he has taken those and made them his own on these recordings. Trust is necessary for that to happen, and I trust these guys.  

In years past I was very hesitant to stray from “my part” because I was afraid it would leave a hole in the arrangement, throw off the band, or expose something I didn’t want the audience to hear or see.  I haven’t had that thought once since Jordan and Ben joined. It’s almost like a game to change up a part during a live performance to see how the band will react and run with it because we aren’t bound by the limits of “my part” anymore.  As Dave says in the episode, at any point in any song “there is always something interesting. Always something worth listening to. Even when only two people are playing - Bobby and Ben, or Bobby and Greg - two people can hold down the song while everyone else can fill in the song in those exposed moments.”  “You Break My Heart” is a good example of this because when we were arranging it Tim played piano instead of guitar under my organ part. The song needed more texture. It was missing layers for the effect we wanted it to have. Eventually those layers were achieved through the horns and through Nicki’s voice.

Tim mentioned that “real horns are becoming popular again” in music today, and they’re definitely showing up for us in a big way because they allow us another avenue to travel as we explore everything our sound can do.  With this new format, as you heard in the podcast, Dave believes that we won’t run into the same problems we used to. “When we had an idea which was just a riff we couldn’t get out of, now that’s exciting because we have the players who can get us in an out of things so easily.  Even a simple riff or groove. We have a bass player who can groove real hard. We have a sax player who can write what he plays. He understands the theory behind it,” and they both offer a second set of eyes on our music. Those of you who have seen us live know our music is better now than it has ever been before.  Those of you who haven’t, you’ll just have to wait until this album drops, or get out to see us!

1. This is the second time we’ve played a show with the guys, and it’s always a good time.  Take a listen! https://www.reverbnation.com/frankhurdband

2. Rhythm, Chords, Melody is also an album by The Reign of Kindo that not enough people know about, so go listen, then proceed to listen to the rest of their discography.  You’ll thank me later.

3. Dave has said for a while that we don’t utilize our three singers with enough variety.  When we all sing it’s almost always a three-part harmony: never true “background vocals”.  This was the perfect opportunity to try that.

4. I haven’t decided whether I think both of the speakers can hear each other or not.  Maybe the second voice is countering the first and disagreeing in person; or maybe neither can hear the other, and they’re both separately telling their versions of this relationship.  

5. Emphasis on “here,” because you know I did it all in my journal, because I’m a nerd.  

6. See Taylor Swift/Adele.  And that’s not a knock on either of them.  Adele is an amazing songwriter, and I’m still holding out for my chance with T-Swift.