hang on

lucky you...

if you peruse this here blog from time to time
you might've found my track by track musings on
the making of beautiful noise
done in november of '06
plus polaroid and nourallah brothers
which i covered way back in august of '06
but now
hot off the presses
is the mother of your brother
snowing in my heart
you're gonna get it straight from the savant's mouth
the track by track dissection
the blow by blow
the who did what when and why

up first is snowing's opening track

"hang on"

"you gotta love this life
even when it has you beat"

it says in my notes
that i wrote this one on july 21, 2005
i don't have much memory of doing so
but i do know
that after it was written
i knew this song would be central to the theme
of my next record
the struggle to overcome all things that threaten our
ability to lead a happy fulfilling life - mainly
depression

"it's just like me to remind you of these things
when the sun is out and blue skies are reigning down"

"hang on" was partly inspired by the suicide of paul hester
who hung himself in a park in australia
in march of 2005
the second verse contains lines that only i would know
related to this incident
i also vaguely referenced "strawberry fields"
which i always suspected was about depression

"the lowest branch with ease
we’re swinging from in our tree"

our friend anju gill had also just taken her own life
in april
so the subject was weighing heavy on my mind
and in my heart

"hang on" came together pretty easily as a recording
john dufilho's crisp, simple drums drive it along
rip captured the exact drum sound i'd had in my mind
dry and dead
i was really pleased after we cut them
a classic chris holt guitar melody takes hold of the chorus'
i think it's one of his best ever
and a marvelous example of his immense knack for coming up with
definitive guitar melodies
i think we cut the guitars on this one just like BN's "sunday morning"
before we ever did the drums
sort of "backwards"
richard martin added some nice lennonesque piano
rip works the mellotron to brilliant effect
especially on the soaring final chorus
as i scream "hang on" over and over
david deshazo added the bass last
to finish it all off nicely
it came together without much of a struggle really
the way it should be
all done with more than a little help from my friends

"another day is here
another day already gone"

ain't that the truth...