Stay Close

I changed up the demo widget because I realized it's had the same old recordings on it for over a year. And also we have a new recording of "She Walked Away," which I thought ought to supersede the ones already over there. While I was at it, I added a recording of a newish song, "Stay Close to Me," which I briefly mentioned back when I first performed it. That song has come to be a favorite of ours, and it's a song people talk to us about a lot.

First, I reckon I ought to own up to my inspiration for the song: There's a scene near the end of Deathly Hallows (yes, the Harry Potter book) where Harry is really scared, and he whispers to a sort of vision of his dead mother, "Stay close to me." And it just made my face hurt when I read it, I was so moved. If you've read the book, I'm sure you know the scene. I won't go more into it because this isn't a book report. I don't really know why it struck me so, but there you go.

I knew right away I wanted to write something called "Stay Close to Me" that evoked some of what I felt in that passage -- the sense of vulnerability in the face of fear, maybe. And I wanted it to be distant enough from the source that I wouldn't have to go around calling it "that Harry Potter song" for people to get it. I also wanted it to be a simple song. I have a tendency to overwrite things, to use six words where one will do, to use broad epic similes instead of just coming out and saying what I mean, to ramble along in multiple, dependent-clause-infused sentences like this one when I should be moving along to the next thought. So I was determined eschew verbosity and to keep the imagery sparse. It did not take long to get a draft worked up, but I had to fight hard all along not to keep adding verses and a bridge and more transitional material and so forth. During revision, I ended up cutting a lot of excess baggage to pare it down to this:

    

Stay Close to Me

Darkness closes in on me
I can't see the way ahead
But if I know you'll stay with me
Then I can face this dread

Stay close to me
I don't want to be alone
Stay close to me
I'm sinking like a stone

My heart is beating in its cage
I'm embarrassed by my fear
But the strength I need is in your gaze
And now my path seems clear

Stay close to me
I can't do this alone
Stay close to me
With you I'm almost home

Stay close to me
Stay close to me

Thanks!

We had a really nice turnout for Saturday night's Java Monkey show, and it might just have been one of our best shows ever. At the expense of getting all left field on you, it was like we were lifted up out of ourselves by the audience's energy. It's something I don't really know how to describe; you just have to feel it. But if you could feel that all the time you'd just about get lost in it.

We did a lot of new songs, but we also did some old ones. And we did several traditionals, like "Moonshiner" and "A Rovin' On a Winters Night." I did Falling, which I've written about badly here. And I played a Townes Van Zandt song, since he's been so much on my mind lately. Of course we did the "Waves" and "She Walked Away" like we always do. One song that Shelle and I were particularly pleased with was "101 Degrees," so here's a new demo of that song, as recorded a couple of weeks ago:

101 Degrees

Enjoy!

Without a Trace

After several postponed studio dates, we finally got one we could keep on Saturday, Feb. 9. Under the expert guidance of our producer, Ryan Williams of JimmyEther.com, Shelle and I recorded seven songs in a fairly relaxed one-day session. We just stood in front of microphones and performed much like we would on stage, except the equipment was better and we could always back up and try again when we made a mistake!

Many of the songs we recorded were new, including "Without a Trace." Shelle had never sung it with me and I'd not performed it until the night before at an ad hoc Java Monkey show where I filled in for a friend. I wrote the song some weeks ago while I was noodling around on the guitar with the TV on. I needed some words to proof-out the melody, and there was a crime show on called "Without a Trace"; that title happened to fit the syllable count just right. One thing led to another, and pretty soon I had what I thought was a decent little song.

That song turned out to be one of the pleasant surprises of the recording session. We were about to give it up after a couple of mediocre takes, but Ryan said, "I really have a feeling about this. If you're willing to give it one more take, I think you guys are going to nail it." Well, you can be the judge of whether we "nailed" it. But in this quick session mix, I feel the seeds of a better song than the one I dashed off distractedly while watching TV.

Download it here: Without a Trace