monday sound #1: sinking home

lyrics

presenting the inaugural monday sound: the focus is more on production and sonic experimentation rather than straight ahead songwriting. there have been a number of similar experiments sprinkled in the monday song mix, but they’ve been outliers. the idea is to focus on sound first, meaning later.  we’ll see where it leads…

this one is a gentle harbinger of the apocalypse. the melody and rhodes kicked things off, with a single take on the piano, but the moody drum samples and synth overdubs defined the atmosphere, and the whole thing declined from there. it’s easily the darkest soundscape to date, edging out “why do you write sad songs,” with the rhythm being quite similar.

i’ve written a lot of dark music when i’ve been feeling dark, but this weekend, i was in a great mood, and really reveled in the misfortune on this one. as i worked on it, i was feeling around for a story line, and i realized it was the soundtrack to the “faceful of teardrops” protagonist driving back home on 80, the reality of his actions sinking in, and a nervous breakdown of sorts consuming him entirely.

i was at a bar the other night, talking about how much i love dark music, that my favorite song when i was sixteen was “don’t leave me now,” on side 2 of “the wall” (there’s a morbid reference in monday song #29 – “thanksgiving”). i listened to it over and over in headphones. i found it thrilling, sort of the way a person with a.d.d calms down on speed, grief and pain artistically rendered makes me feel glad to be alive.

the mix is definitely overly dense due to time constraints. if I ever move this to an album, i’ll take the time to thin out the instruments and ride the sounds a bit better. a lot of tracks to juggle in a short amount of time…

i still plan to get the last three monday songs under my belt, but no rules on the order.