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Tag: songwriting

New Song “On the Day They Overturned”

June 27, 2022

In the immediate aftermath of the United States Supreme Court decision to overturn Roe Vs. Wade on Friday, Ed Hale performed a new song entitled “On the Day They Overturned” on his Instagram account and his Transcendent Television channel on YouTube, along with a copy of the song’s powerful, at times graphic lyrics.
“I haven’t been writing as many songs with lyrics lately as you know, because I’ve really been into writing these orchestral guitar instrumentals. But this one came rather fast & furious in the last 48 hours. Like everybody else i was in a state of shock all day after hearing the news, dumbstruck really.”

“The song came to me late Friday night, popped in my head pretty much completed. Saturday I just had to sit down and flesh out the lyrics. Took Sunday to fine tune them. But the song already knew what it was, knew what it wanted to say. I just had to listen.”

On social media Hale wrote, “This song was particularly inspired by human rights and enlightenment activist Devkirn Khalsa, based on a whirlwind of important, intense conversations we had during those first 48 hours. Some of the lyrics are nearly direct translations of conversations we’ve had about these topics in the last two days.”

Performed on a 1971 Hofner 489 acoustic guitar. Two microphones going direct in mono. No treatment or effects.

Lyrics

“On the Day They Overturned”

On the day they overturned
I looked away the world was burning
On the day they overturned
As we were fighting to be heard
All was lost but we didn’t understand
How the rights we had
Could be wrestled from our hands
On the day they overturned
On the day they overturned
Didn’t I see you crawling
Through an alley on your knees
The scars of pain
Carved in your face
As you lay bleeding in the street
Like an animal
I know
That’s what we fought for

On the day they overturned
I looked away, my body trembling
On the day they overturned
A final battle cry was heard
A billion people gathered on the earth
To mourn a nation’s death
So soon after it’s birth
On the day they overturned
On the day they overturned
Didn’t we see it coming
From a million miles away
When states misguided
By stacked courts and gods
Become theocracies
It’s inevitable
I know
That’s what we fought for
I know
Isn’t that what we fought for

On the day we overcame
stared straight ahead
And never fumbled
On the day we overcame
And stopped corruption in our name
All was lost
But they didn’t understand
How it was theirs to lose
As we snatched it from their hands
On the day we overcame
On the day we overcame
We finally raised the flag of freedom
In the morning light
Not for the men the straight
the christian or the wealthy or the white
But for everyone
I know
It’s what we fought for

Music and Lyrics by Ed Hale

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Activism, America at War, Current Events, Human Rights, Music, Music Videos, Politics and Government acoustic music, acoustic songs, activism song, folk songs, new Ed Hale songs, roe versus wade, roe vs. wade, roevswade, roevwade, singer-songwriter, songwriting

Songwriting in Your Sleep

April 27, 2015

A funny thing has been transpiring lately. Something completely unexpected and almost supernatural in a way. If there is any “one thing” that I do well, out of the thousands and thousands of things we do or learn to do or are forced to do while we’re journeying here in the earthly realm — for surely every person possesses such a trait — for me personally, if there is one thing that I do better than every and anything else it is having a natural proclivity to prolifically writing songs and music composition. This is no secret, I know. It is common knowledge. So much so that I don’t even believe the main point of this entry should be to even remotely explore this strange character trait or why it comes so easy to me compared to so many other things. I am sure we have discussed it before here in these pages over the years.

Instead I simply wish to make note of this rather incredible new event that has begun transpiring lately on a near nightly basis. A little backstory…. We just finished recording and finishing over 45 new songs for the “new album”, which we now know will turn into three new albums that will be released over the course of this year. Choosing the songs is always one of the most challenging aspects of entering the recording studio with the guys. For I come in with alphabetized binders filled with thousands upon thousands of songs. Each in my humble estimation as good and worthy as the next to be included on our latest new album. So begins the process of me sitting there singing and playing the guys and the producers and engineers the songs that I have tabbed for whatever new album we happen to be working on and together as a group we semi-democratically choose which songs are yeses, which songs are maybes and which ones are flat-out nos.

Sometimes the decisions make sense to me — often times we go in with a set idea of concept in mind and thus only certain kinds of songs would be appropriate. While other times the group’s decisions about which songs are definite nos disturbs and confuses me. Everyone hears music differently. It is so subjective that it is impossible for one person to even be able to comprehend how another person hears a song let alone why they may or may not like it. And I must admit that at times I even find myself getting hurt a little at how quick they are to dismiss a song that I absolutely believe is “an incredible song!!!” But that feeling is usually fleeting for as soon as the discussion ends I start up another and the process begins all over again — every song carries with it such a special collection of feelings and memories and emotions that it is easy to get carried up and away with it as it was with the last. We will easily listen to a hundred or so songs before we eventually narrow it down to fifty or so. And from there we are all keenly aware that the hard part is yet to come as we have to keep narrowing it down to the ten or so that will eventually be known to be on that new album historically.

With this latest project — lord knows we were very aware that time was of the essence and that we needed to record and release the follow-up to Ballad On Third Avenue as quickly as possible. Ed Hale the artist had never garnered such overt commercial success before and never at such a level as what we were experiencing in that moment. But instead of being disciplined and finishing quickly the project soon turned into yet another large epic battle to not only record a mammoth batch of 45 new songs, but also to create three completely new and totally different sounding albums, AND to incorporate several new innovative techniques into the recording process — using musicians from all over the world to record their parts virtually at their own studios and send them in to our engineers to import the songs into our system — a process that would at the very least create an extremely confusing and disharmonious sound but at best could just possibly create something completely fresh and unique sounding. (Since I am writing THIS post-recording now and we are in the mixing stage, I can relay that it did indeed create an incredibly massive oftentimes muddied even noisy fusion of sound and cacophony at times, this is true…but some of the songs are sounding fantastically unique and innovative in their “sound”, a sound no one has ever heard us create before with more instruments and a wider variety of instruments and sounds than we’ve ever incorporated into our music. Not that it doesn’t still sound like “us”. It does. It has the Transcendence sound all over it… Still basically Brit Pop with a classic rock bent… But the new technique we attempted worked. It is very exciting to listen to. Goosebumps inducing at times even. The mad experiment worked. It’s just taking longer to mix and finish. But the wait will be worth it I believe. )

Needless to say that since all of our attention and focus at the moment and for the next few months if not the entire year will be dedicated to finishing these new albums and then to marketing and touring , the last thing in the world I want to spend any time doing is writing new songs. But what to do when you are able to write new songs as easy as breathing, when it comes that easy to you? You see a guitar, pick it up and bam out comes a song. You sit down at a piano and within minutes I am deeply inside of the inexpressible comfort and pleasure of “new song composition”, completely adrift in it and oblivious to everything else going on around me. Not the most productive way to be when your attention needs to be on marketing and mixing and planning and implementing a new album release.

So when we moved back to New York full-time late last year I decided to store ALL of my musical equipment including all guitars and keyboards in our storage warehouse with our other house items so that way I wouldn’t and couldn’t even be tempted to pick up an instrument and write any songs. For we already have far too many to believe we will ever really be able to get them all recorded. That’s just the hard painful truth of the matter. One that is still hard for me to bare the thought of. Thousands of songs literally equates to hundreds of albums at an average rate of ten songs per album. We’ve done the math. It’s a no-brainer. We will never even come close to recording all the songs that I’ve already written… let alone all the ones that I am destined to still write. In a word, it sucks.

And in that, this strange character trait, this gift as some call it, is (and has always been) both a blessing and a curse. For with each new song that I have composed for years going back and from this day forward I am immediately made aware that one of two not-preferable things will happen: either I am pouring my heart and soul into bringing this song down from the ethers into the earthly realm only for it to sit on paper forever never to be recorded, OR for it to be recorded which instantly mandates that another ten that came before it will suffer the same fate. It is very much like being forced to choose which of your children gets to eat and live a long and prosperous life and which you must starve, knowing that they will surely die never to live a full life or be known by anyone but yourself and never to be known by history.

I’ve played this game with the Divine Force many times before. Refusing to accept the gift and refusing to write any new songs for a while, despite the fact that it is my very nature to do just that more and better than anything else that I do in this life. Sometimes I fear that He/She/It will punish me for my impudence and take away the ease at which I can write a song. But that hasn’t happened yet. Truly I don’t believe that it ever will. For I believe that God knows and understands that I know and understand that my ability to pull these songs out of thin air and bring them to life is as pure an expression of Him/Her/It and their glory more than anything else that I can possibly do or say in this life. They serve through their very existence and how they are brought to being in this world as a glorious reminder of the mystical magical supernatural nature of the Divine Force Itself. My guess is that God gifts every person on earth a special and unique ability such as this as a means to express His/Her/It’s Divinity on earth. Our task is to find what that special gift is and become great at it and share it with the world as a reminder of this powerful connection we share with this mysterious Divine Force that comprises and creates and flows through everything in the known and unknown universe.

But I cannot help but feel impulsively rebellious at times. It is a large task. A time-suck like no other. If I did nothing but sat in a room for 24 hours with a guitar and a piano I would easily be tasked with what I guess would be at least writing fifteen to twenty-five songs in those 24 hours. That’s the easy part…the writing of them… The subtle nature of hearing them come to life in your ears, in your mind’s eye… They already exist… Somewhere else, in some other dimension, and all I am doing is hearing them as they already exist and bringing them down to this earthly dimension so others can hear them. BUT from there there IS still work to do. Flushing out the lyrics. Discovering what THEY wish to be… For they too already exist. Arranging and producing the sound of it. So it is a time consuming burden as much as it is a gift or blessing. But I believe God knows this and accepts that at times I may feel prone to rebel from the obligation.

And such was the case this year as I decided to not bring any instruments with me. And here I have lived now for more than four months without having access to any guitars laying around the house.

But something changed. A few months ago I started having dreams where I would hear these incredible songs — usually it was some random character in my dream performing the song on stage or just sitting there in a room with me and couple of friends or I even hear them on the radio or playing in the air…and then this voice in my head says “Ed you are dreaming. It is you who is writing this song. Wake up and record it NOW. Do not let this song go. Do it now.” So I do just that.

This isn’t the first time this has happened to me. And many other songwriters tell stories of having similar experiences. So I have became accustomed to keeping some type of recorder on my nightstand for just such these occasions. Now I can just use the voice recorder on my iPhone to do this. And so I do. What strikes me most though about this most recent string of new songs is the sheer quantity at which they are coming. Near nightly now. As if God had a leg up on me the whole time and decided “okay then son, if you refuse to pick up an instrument to pick out the songs from the ethers then I will just deliver them to you fully formed in the dreams of your sleep. For that is what is happening now. I hear them fully formed in my head while I am sleeping and I just wake up enough to turn the recorder on and sing them into it. I always listen back to them the next day to see if they are total shite and I was just kidding myself as we are prone to do in our sleep and yet they never are. They are always totally original and beautiful glorious new songs. And yet I have to do absolutely nothing to make them this way. I certainly am not “writing them” or creating them myself. I am simply singing into the voice recorder exactly as I hear it in my dream. It is very close to being almost supernatural. Like channeling. And it leaves me impressed with God’s persistence and ingenuity. And of course with his generosity. I thought I was in control and perhaps had one up on Him, but it turns out that the joke was on me. Truth be told, I am more than fine with this.

– Posted by The Ambassador using the BlogPress app on an iPhone



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Uncategorized channeling songs from other dimensions, ed hale, god, new albums, songwriting, The Divine, writing songs

On the Wretched State of the Music Business

November 7, 2014

A film producer was waxing nostalgic earlier today about how good the music of the 70s was and wondering why the music of today is so horrendous. I have already shared here in past posts that while I wholeheartedly agree with this notion I also recognize that there is some incredible music and musical innovation happening at the moment. It’s an exciting time creatively for music. But with a few caveats:

— It’s just not mainstream.

— It’s no longer about music in the traditional sense as in playing an instrument; the computer has turned into a musical instrument.

— It’s no longer about songs and songwriting as much as about SOUND i.e. What does it “sound like” forget the song or lack thereof underneath.

— It’s no longer limited to a field of a few savants but rather it’s become a very wide open playing field where every and anyone can throw in with their momentary contribution.

— Having “talent”, i.e. being able to sing or play an instrument or perform live is no longer a necessary requirement.

I was ruminating about the same exact thing yesterday. Here’s the thing: the 90s was so filled with kack (garbage) that it DID jade us to what followed, even though some of it was still very good.

Bare in mind the PEAK of the $$$ revenue generation in the history of the music biz was ’98, when the formula was “release ten diff copies/replicas of whatever happens to be hot at the moment” and avoid originality because it’s “dangerous” (may lose money) — (this started in the 80s w the “first wave of consolidation” (of the labels); the revenue has fallen precipitously since, to where we now have an industry that can no longer sustain itself due to no customer demand for the product (more than just one factor, for sure, but yes one can easily blame part of it on the industry’s “churn and burn” practice of releasing crap over artistry jading and turning off the consumer).

Certainly the trend to entice the audience with manufactured pseudo-music ala “DJs” churning out generic computer generated tones over hypnotic dance beats in lieu of real musicians because it was much more profitable also contributed to the wretched state we are in as well. We addressed this menacing trend in Ed Hale and the Transcendence on our NOTHING IS COHESIVE album with the song “Somebody kill the DJ” — whose lyrics if one listens carefully are literally both a lamenting of the loss of traditional music making AND a rallying cry to kill DJs if one has the chance just to save music. Perhaps it was tongue in cheek hyperbole to a certain degree. Perhaps it wasn’t. But regardless it’s way past that now.

BUT, though it was easy to miss, the 2000s DID actually produce some of the best artists albums and songs of all time still (think Rufus Wainwright, Aimee Mann, Phoenix, Strokes, Coldplay, Muse, Jet, Travis, Aqualung, Radiohead, Sigur Ross, etc etc there are hundreds more…). Problem is: “career artistry” is no longer a practice we can afford, i.e. paying for an artist to have a career both with hits and/or no hits. Combine that — the inability to afford career artists financially — w the “anyone can claim to be an artist due to technological advances” trend and we land right where we are today.

Now we are in unchartered waters… all of us, fans and artists alike, adrift in a wicked system where there are no gatekeepers, tastemakers, mentors or arbiters; the trend is “anyone and everyone gets a shot, about 10% of all who try will get 1 hit, 1% may get 2, and 1/10th of 1% may be able to eek a living from it”. But just how one does that is completely different than in times past because all of the traditional revenue streams have dried up. The business still chugs along but broken bankrupt and rudderless because the old rules no longer apply and new rules are constantly forming and re-morphing as Silicon Valley and Wall Street continue to take more and more control over the business side of things. Geniuses they may be — but with no heart and having been bred on coding hacking and the quick creation and abandonment of disposal commodities for profit and fame (websites, apps, software, devices, hardware, etc.) they have reduced music to a perceptually valueless commodity. Now an entire generation — several in fact — have been indoctrinated to fall for that preposterous notion, e.g. music has no value, just like last week’s “app of the week”.

What used to be intangible and transcendent, art heart passion balls love the mind God survival AND entertainment–with $$$ as a side benefit– is now a barely breathing industry that breeds one hit wonders galore through this “replicate what is happening NOW and for Gods sake do NOT innovate for fear of striking out on your ONE chance at bat”, but no “career artists”. Career artists is a term coined in the early 70s that referred to “artists who might not make us very much money NOW but are still very important artistically and therefore might make us money LATER, once the people catch up with them”. We used the money generated from one hit wonders to pay for the careers of career artists. Hence we’d allow Dylan to do a country album or Hendrix to do a 20 minute instrumental jam song or Pink Floyd to record a whole album as one 60 minute song about pigs and dogs or Lennon to release an album of him screaming at the top of his lungs for an hour or Joni to explore jazz fusion etc etc etc. We allowed it because we could afford it AND because it “might” hold artistic merit. Neil Young Lou Reed David Byrne Warren Zevon Led Zeppelin even Van Halen and a million others were born from this ideal…let’s support them a while and see if the public eventually catches up.

The industry can no longer afford this in today’s age because there is no money to be had. And there are a million reasons for this — not just one or two. But making music still costs money as it always has. So WHO is making music now? In this environment? The best and brightest? The really talented? Or “anyone who can afford to”? Sadly the latter. The hardest aspect of the new music business to fathom is that the best and brightest may BE making music somewhere, MAYBE, IF they can even afford to…(big if), but we may never hear it or even hear about it because there’s no money being generated from it, not even enough to launch it out of the artists small local zone.

Very suckass, both for us as artists and for us as music lovers.

Will this change? Can it? Yes. The companies behind the artists simply need to 1, look for the cream NOT the hits, and 2, support those artists through their career in every manner, financially emotionally physically, with mental support and mentoring and lessons etc just as they used to. At least for a few years to see if anything will come out of it. The 70s was the PEAK of that methodology in our industry. Many people consider the 70s to be the BEST decade for music of all time. For a brief period, artists were allowed to record an album that yielded NO hit IF it had artistic merit or the potential to — JUST because it was “art” and that’s what art does. If it yielded a “hit” and made money, even better.

At some point in our future we the people, all of us, will become tired of the current trend of music as a commodity and nothing more and speak up demanding art from our music once again. And through that desire we will create a way to pay for it so that the best and brightest are able to be heard AND make a decent living. It’s only a matter of time.

We are already observing artists and their respective labels devise ingenious ways to generate money through music outside of the traditional means (consumers buying it or paying for it) whether it be U2 giving their album away for free via Apple (Apple paid for it) or Jay Z selling advertising and product placement embedded in his lyrics AND giving it away for free via AT&T or Coldplay having Target pay them or Taylor Swift having Diet Coke pay her etc etc. Of course we can’t all afford giant corporate sponsors and wouldn’t want to if we could. (Personally I could never get away with endorsing something as overtly poisonous as a diet soda — my fans wouldn’t permit me to). But the trend is definitely shifting towards “getting large companies to pay for our music making so the fans don’t have to, or better put don’t want to.” The future possibilities are seemingly endless.

In the meantime we all must realize that even today there really is some incredible music being made out there right this very minute by artists who are busy living and Dying Van Gogh. We just need to look harder for it. And more importantly PAY for it when we do on occasion find it. C

– Posted by The Ambassador using BlogPress on an iPhone 8s Custom



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Uncategorized 70s music, DJs, ed hale, Music Business, Somebody kill the DJ, songwriting, talent, Transcendence

On Songwriting…

July 10, 2013

In the recording studio all week this week. Working on the new album(s). We were aiming for one when we started last year, the follow up to Ballad On Third Avenue. But we ended up with 34 songs, with two very different styles… so it’s really two different albums we are creating at the same time. One is more acoustic and organic sounding. The other is still ballad based but more on the pop side. We had a temporary freak out a few weeks back when going to cut the vocals for the song “Oh Sophia” (yeah the one I demoed on YouTube a few years ago in the Song Log series). Couldn’t find a HUGE batch of songs. I was going CRAzy. As always Princess Little Tree stayed calm, kept me from having a nervous breakdown, and eventually we found them. Had them in a big stack next of papers next to a laptop I barely ever use in an office I barely ever use in order to make some edits to them or type them in.

[There is a process. A strict one. Like most artists I’ve slowly huddled into a very strict and detailed highly OCD and methodical routine for songwriting and tracking all the songs. Because after the first few years you start to realize you’re going to be dealing with something really big. A giant project with a mass of paperwork and tapes etc. For some reason whenever I think about this topic my mind immediately jumps to this one distinct memory of being at our summer home in the Cayman Islands and announcing the whole family the moment that I hit 100 songs written. I was 15 or 16 years old at the time. It felt like a big accomplishment. Now it seems kind of meager and embarrassing. But that’s the nature of any art or craft I’m beginning to realize. As we evolve and progress our past achievements tend to seem small compared to our present reality. I wouldn’t know how to even ascertain how many songs I’ve written now.

I remember hitting 1,000 about a decade ago. I remember when I was a kid hearing about how Steve Allen the famous comedian and talk show host had written roughly 1,000 songs and how surprising that was because most people weren’t aware that he was also an accomplished songwriter. I remember feeling angry with myself… for not having achieved that yet. So the 1,000 mark felt like a big deal at the time; maybe… not really now that I think about it. I “remembered” the Steve Allen bit for a day or two and the buzz quickly dissipated.

I remember hitting 3,000. From there I just stopped counting. Perhaps that’s the sign that you’ve finally arrived — when you reach the point where you stop counting. When it becomes so routine to you that the number doesn’t even matter anymore. I’m sure painters, career painters, have no idea how many paintings they’ve created.

Regardless of how they start — a tune pops up in your head, or in a dream, or while you’re strumming a guitar or tripping out on the piano — that song gets into a recording device (now most of the time my iPhone) as quickly as possible.

[From there I start putting it to paper. One of many legal pads kept in one of many leather binders with one of many thin silver Cross pens sitting in an inner connected loop. The song may stay that way for a few weeks to a few years or decades. When I feel like it I go back to it and work a little more on it. I never force a song to flesh out. I’m always working on so many that I don’t have to. More importantly I don’t think forced songs ever come out well. If I’m not feeling it, that song will just sit there. And I keep plenty of legal pads in leather binders around filled with plenty of songs. So there’s never any rush. Usually I can just pound through them though. A good song writes itself. Once it comes, all I have to do is just ride it like a wave. It’s all in my head already. I hear it. I hear it’s potential is more like it. So all i have to do is just keep playing it over and over again, massaging it along the way each run through, listening for different things, subtle changes and additions…

[I take breaks, a few hours, a few days or weeks, and I listen to the song play in my head over and over again. It’s like a repeating record. It never stops. Usually a few of them at a time. And as I listen to them up there, they start to take shape and form themselves, as if they already exist — (which if one subscribes to the whole “time isn’t linear but circular” paradigm, then they do already exist… just in the future which is really in the here-now only we don’t usually recognize that) — so by the time I pick up an instrument to work on it more I have a much better idea of what it’s meant to sound like as a finished product.

[Once I am done with writing it all out on pages in the legal pad, I make a copy of that original stack of pages in the legal pad. When a legal pad is finished and all the pages are filled I send it off to my mom who has been saving them for all these years since I was 17. She has boxes of them. Tons of them. Now we’re in the process of moving them to a bank vault. Can’t take the risk anymore. I keep the copies of those pages in boxes and take them with me wherever I live. Just to have access to the original (copy of the original) handwritten notes. I then sit down and type the song up and save it on my laptop in a giant database of all the songs… a folder filled with thousands of songs. There are two sub-folders: songs that have been recorded and songs that haven’t yet been recorded. Obviously the latter folder is still much larger than the former. The goal is the exact opposite of that.

[Once I save the song as a file, I print it out and it goes into a clear protector sheet and into one of many black binders where all the printed out songs are alphabetized. The black song binders are also grouped into two different groups, one for songs that have already been recorded — for when we are planning set lists for live shows, and one group of binders for songs that have not yet been recorded — so we can flip through all the songs when choosing songs to record a new album. Pretty anal huh? It works though. Smooth. No guess work. I can do it all in my sleep. All the kinks have been worked out. That’s the process in a nutshell. Why I’m telling you this I have no idea. But hey, at least we finally have this down for posterity. This is how I do it.]

I fell behind. Once Princee Little Tree and I fell head over heels in love for the millionth time back in ’08 I pretty much fell behind in everything… And taking care of the songs was definitely one of those areas. So there are songs and song notebooks in various stages of processing all over the freaking place. We travel so much that I’m lucky if I remember to bring at least just one binder with me for songwriting. Always one at least. Problem is that there are tens of other binders at home with songs in various stages of being half-written that I always seem to want when I don’t have them.

But it’s never a huge deal. I can always record ideas into my phone and scribble them down on a new notebook. That’s the thing. They’re going to eventually get typed into the main database, I know this. So it gives me a real sense of security.

So that’s what I did for the last few months. Typed up a truck load of songs that needed to be typed and put into the database and then printed out. Now I am organizing and alphabetizing them. There are hundreds. Way too many. But I need access to at least the 34 for these new albums and the 25 that are on the other new album(s), what we’ve been affectionately referring to as “the Girls Album” for the last few years. Hopefully we will finish that one this year along with these other two.

So yeah. I’ve been sitting here while the engineers are in the studio working on stuff, I’ve been organizing and alphabetizing all the song lyric-sheets from the last 25 years. (I ran out of space in this master binder I was using and decided I need to break some of the binders into broader sets.. Maybe something like Songs A to B, C to D, etc. Like that. Because the binders get so big and heavy and then songs start falling out. I’m just doing it to the typed-up ones that haven’t already been classified so far. Gotta be 1000 songs here. Big project.

Every time I come across one from our college years, the Broken Spectacles years when we were smoking out and tripping on acid everyday, there’s something very special about THOSE songs… A really deep vibey heaviosity to them. They weren’t necessarily “hit songs” — in fact they’re downright un-hit songs — long and wild and free-form and complex, with infinitely long chord progressions that go on forever — similar to “Bored” or “Rise and Shine” but even more so; but you know, that’s not what we were about back then, that’s not what we were going for.

I cannot help but feel as we are working on recording these new albums now that something has gotten lost along the way. Songs just seem to be way better when you write them when you’re tripping on something. I know that is so NOT the thing to ever say, especially if you’re a public figure… But sometimes I cannot help but think that… Some of these songs I am revisiting and seeing for the first time in years… Wow… They are just soo sooo good. So groovy and vibey….

There is so much pressure now. As a professional singer/songwriter, to make a living from it, to make enough money to live and support a family from it, especially now after we’ve had a few hits under our belt… It’s not like it was back then when we were in our late teens and early twenties. When we just did whatever we wanted. When we were going for a heavy serious vibe. I mean, now, it’s just so different…

I have to go. Have to finish this project because the guys are waiting for me. Just need to remember from looking at all these songs what it was like back then.. what THOSE songs were like… how much emotion and passion and EVERYTHING we put into them. I honestly don’t feel that commercial radio, that the commercial music market has a place for that kind of music. Really, that’s the thing. When we were young and only had dreams, we didn’t think about these things. We thought we could force the industry and the people to listen to and like whatever it is that we did. We learned the hard way. I mean I struggled for years as a starving artist. Decades. So I learned… But I loved every day of it. Homeless? More than once. No problem. I actually enjoyed the experience. It was an adventure.

Our biggest hits have come from sincerely sitting down and crafting hit songs. Being very careful in every step of the process to do things in a way that structures the song and the sound and the feel of the song to resonate with the commercial music market. And it’s paid off. Big time. You aren’t going to hear me complaining. Because lets’ face it, as these Diaries and everyone who knows me can testify, I spent YEARS doing it my way, doing whatever I wanted to do for ME. So I got a lot of that out of my system.

It was only later that I started thinking it would be fun just to “try” creating “commercially viable” music. And luckily it actually worked. I mean it’s really not rocket science. Writing hit songs is just doing the exact opposite of what you would normally do as an authentic and sincere artist who loves to innovate. Funny but true. You just write the song the way that all the other songs that people listen to sound like. Rather than try to get creative and innovate. It’s like yes you innovate during the production and sound creation process. But not during the songwriting process. People don’t want to hear innovation. At least not in the commercial world. They just want to hear what they’re used to hearing plus something a little special and different. But they don’t want to hear a twenty minute song that traverses thirty different chords and changes keys ten times… Sucks, for us, the artists. But that’s how it is now. Didn’t used to be that way. Inventiveness in music used to be highly valued. But not right now. Not in this climate. The top three songs of the last three years have been “The Harlem Shake”, “Gangam Style” and “Thrift Shop”. Fuck me. Fuck us all. We’re screwed, as artists, we’re screwed.

But frankly I like those songs too. I dig the commercial ones that we do, and that other people do. I like the “sound” of them. Not the songwriting… But the sound of them. But honestly not even one-tenth as much as i like the crazy wild non-commercial ones. THOSE are the ones that I really love. That really get me off. But then what? Get a day job. I mean that’s really the quandary. People don’t realize it. But those are our choices. We become a slave to the tastes of populace OR we settle with not making a ton of money from making music… We can always make money from doing other things… And I have NO problem with that, EXCEPT that it greatly limits our ability to spend all our time making music — which is THE thing I enjoy most in this life hands down — because we have to spend the majority of our day to day life working at something else… So it is definitely preferable to create music that, commercial or not, is popular with enough people that it generates a ton of money. Most of the time that means it’s COMMERCIAL, i.e popular, i.e. liked by many people, current, trendy, a valuable commodity to the masses. Commercial, let’s face it.

Maybe one day this will all change. My hope is that one day I will feel as though I “have enough money” from this that I can “stop working” for a living, i.e. stop creating music to make money — and have enough money saved up that I don’t need to generate revenue anymore…. Then I can just make the kind of music that I want to. And then if people like it, great. If they don’t and we only sell a few hundred copies, that’s great too. Either way, I’ll be following the inner muse. (Is it inner?? Not sure about that… save it for another blog post.) Gotta run. Peace.

 



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Uncategorized art versus selling out, Broken Spectacles, commercial songwriting versus indie, Ed Hale songs, pop music versus good music, songs are better when you’re high or tripping, songwriting

Taming the Beast — Recording Resumes

July 9, 2013

Today we resume recording for the new album(s). 34 songs in total were laid down last summer by me on rhythm guitar and vocals, The Poet on drums and The Ex Norwegian on bass and production. All in New York. For the record (pardon the pun) those songs are: American Cinematheque, Another Day in the Apocalypse, Baby Blue Doll, Give Me Blue Skies, Born to Lose, Closer to You, Crazy Heart, Don’t Be Sad My Love, Gimme Some Rock ‘n’ Roll, The Stranger (Hello Hello Hello), Hold On My Love to Keep You Strong, When the Battle is Through, Honestly, I felt Freedom When You Said No, I’m Looking For, It Will Be Me, It’s Alright It’s Okay, Junk, Knee Deep in the Apocalypse, Marsha’s Sleeping, Jack Johnson (working title…), My Black Brother, Never Too Far Apart, Oh Sophia, Our Love Still Turns Me On, Silence Kills, So For Real, Summer Flowers, The Ambassador in Paris, The Prince of New York, Welcome to the Rest of the World, White House Jihad, and Without You.

We’re in Seattle presently. We’re primarily working on my parts, adding rhythm guitars and some minor leads — mostly acoustic and some electric, lead and background vocals, and various different keyboards and percussion instruments. From here, once I’m done with all my parts, the songs will be sent out to Vancouver in LA to add his special Transcendence magic (which “literally” translates to lead guitars, various keyboards, percussion and background vocals), The Ex Norwegian — who may clean up or redo some of his bass parts and add various other guitars and keyboards, DJ Johnny Rose who will add piano and keyboard parts, Infinito who will add percussion, and Zeke Zaskin, who, besides being the one who will ultimately  mix and master the albums to completion, is usually encouraged to add additional guitars, keyboard and background vocals. Various other musicians will come in to add things like cello and strings and horns.

For all of our albums over the last 11 years we have used Trophy Wife as our main female background vocalist along with Vancouver and me and Zeke. But on All Your Heroes Become Villains and Ballad On Third Avenue we used The Toad for background vocals as well (this momentous occasion detailed in Diaries entries back in ’04 ’05 and ’06). He really knows how to match and augment my vocals and is a freaking stellar harmony vocals writer. So I’m hoping that all the tracks can be packaged up and sent to him down in Florida so he can add whatever he wants to. This is going to be the strangest album we’ve ever recorded due to the fact that we’re all in so many different states and all the recording will be run solo and sent back and forth over the internet or via giant external hard drives. A lot of albums are recorded like that these days. It’s surprisingly less infrequent than most people would think.

It’s not been easy getting back into it. It’s going to take a while to get back in the vibe of these songs and the respective albums that they will eventually become a part of. Besides the fact that the band is experiencing some of that seven year itch meltdown drama that is customary with bands who have been together for a long time. Vancouver is vehement about not wanting any “fake drums” on the record, meaning drum machines, samplers, keyboards, sequencers, MIDI drums — anything but “real drums, i.e. acoustic drums played on a regular old fashioned drum set.

Most popular music that we hear today on radio or TV is created using machine made drums or samples and NOT “real drums” or at best a combination of both, which is what The Ex Norwegian and I recommend doing this time out. An artist has a much better chance of the music sounding modern , current or contemporary AND has a lot more control technically of those sounds, compared to “just” “real drums”. He actually sent us an email saying “sorry guys, it’s me or fake drums”.  On the other hand The Ex Norwegian is so freaking mad at all the drama that he doesn’t want to have anything to do with Vancouver anymore because of all this. Me and the other guys are stuck smack dab in the middle.We love Vancouver, especially his ability to make beautiful music. We put up with a lot of shit because of his unique talents and believe it’s totally worth it. He is after all a HUGE component of our sound.

Of course, it’s all subjective. What one person calls “real drums” can be totally different than what another person calls real drums. Gotye released a series of documentariy styled short videos detailing how he created his last album — the one that everyone is familiar with now due to that hit he had last year and when he’s discussing this one song he shows how he set up two floor toms and a snare and remarks “this song is special because it’s the first we ever used any real drums on any of my music…” So what we’re doing is normal for the industry at this point in time and in fact will sound a lot more like the music that everyone is now accustomed to. That’s what we want. We really want these albums to “sound” modern and current and professional, pristine, polished, commercial, regardless of what is expected for your typical rock band.

I spent all day yesterday listening to the two rock radio stations here in Seattle (both are awesome stations — I wish all the other cities in the States had stations as good as we have here) and just about 95% of the songs that were played all had computerized drum sounds on them as opposed to acoustic drums. It’s just the sound that people are used to now. We don’t see anything wrong with going in that direction for an album or two, especially considering the fact that The Poet is still “playing a drum kit.” He’s just “triggering” drum samples that are inside of the computer or drum machines etc. It’s really freaking cool. Working with the technology that we available to us now to make the best sounding album we can using all the tools we can find. It’s fun and creative.

I hope Vancouver catches up. Not only do I worry about us as a band but also about him. I personally don’t want him to fall behind just because of any purism or principle. He deserves to be well known and popular for his skills and musical gifts. But you’ve got to keep up; no one is going to hold your hand and drag you to what’s happening. But he’s always taken a long time to catch up in these matters. Back in 2001 when I first started getting into what was then being called “indie rock”, he hated it. It wasn’t until this year that he started to “like” indie rock. Of course now indie rock is old and stale and the cool thing to do would be to steer clear from it and head into a totally new direction — which is exactly what The Ex Norwegian suggested we do on these two albums. Try to mix our rock band sensibility with a more modern and popular music approach in order to capitalize on the thrilling success we had with the last solo album. I dig the idea. Just hope we can pull it off.

More later. Gotta run.

 



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Uncategorized indie rock, MIDI, modern music, popular music, recording songs, rock band drama, rock radio, songwriting, using real drums versus machines or drum samples

Videos of New Songs Live Ed Hale

December 13, 2009

New Songs Log Playlist


YouTube Playlist of on-going series of Ed Hale working out new songs roughly recorded here and there as they come and then posted to YouTube. Usually under-rehearsed and too soon after they were written. But a cool thing. Definitely a good way to keep track of songs that might get away for future use, and good reference for the tuning and chords used.

 

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Music, Music Videos, Personal Life ed hale, new songs, playing live, playlist, songwriting, videos, YouTube

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