Well here's episode 2 of the story behind the song.
This song isn't released- you can only hear the studio version when the record comes out, so pre-order now and you'll get it first!
I wrote last episode about the online songwriting group I participate in. The challenge weeks start on Sunday- the first prompt goes up Saturday night. The goal is to write a song every day for a week. Some weeks that gets hard. Maybe I'm not feeling it, maybe I'm busy, maybe I'm just lazy. Who knows.
In 2024 I was doing a challenge week in August. I was doing pretty well- six for six as of Friday. We had a gig on Saturday, my wife was out of town, and the prompt was stupid. So I really blew off writing for most of the day, then I had to go play a gig. We were playing out towards Greely, at a venue we really like. It was an outdoor thing, and it was REALLY hot. I think it broke 100. We were under shade, but it was hot. So we played the thing, which was a late afternoon deal, and we sweated out about ten ponds in three sets as you do. But it was fun, we like the place and the crowd was awesome.
So we're loading up at maybe 8pm or so, and we're hot and sweaty, and its an hour home. I get in the truck, and by the time I'm turning South on I25 I have these lines running through my head, as sometimes happens. I had the stereo cranked, and suddenly I was in a really good mood. And these lines kept running around in my head, and suddenly I was using a bit of the prompt that I had thought was stupid. And it's making a pretty good chorus. And the verses are sort of gelling. And all this is happening while I'm ripping down I25 at 80 miles per hour with the sun starting to set to the west behind the mountains (which if you haven't seen it, well, it's nice, see the photo at the top of the post) and Chris Knight singing really dark songs on the stereo.
So it's almost dark and I make it home, come through the door, feed the dogs, go straight downstairs to my office, and write out the whole lyric almost as it ends up on the record. Some songs are about ideas, some are stories, this one is basically a journal entry. But I think it worked really well, and when I picked up my guitar to try to play it, it knew what it wanted to be. Sometimes this is how it goes.
Also, I went 7 for 7 that week.
I took it to the guys in the band almost immediately, and it was in the last set of songs we recorded for this record. John's guitar on this track is some of my favorite of the record. Somehow we got an almost David Lindley vibe going and John really crushed it. Then Brian McRae and I were looking for what else the song needed, and we got Finn O'Sullivan to come in and sing some parts on it. She's awesome (check her out), and her part added something I really liked to the song.
Obviously, this song is unreleased, so the only way to hear it now is us playing it live (see below), or even better, pre-order the album in CD or vinyl. If you do pre-order you can get an exclusive release t-shirt to go with your new album. All physical media ships at the start of July. So you'll get it before anyone can stream it! You can also get one of the exclusive shirts if you buy a release show ticket. The show is July 18. So do that.
This is what we look like live. Loud and rowdy. It's what we do.
I'm playing solo in an apple orchard on May 23. See ya there. -JS