-
Hickory Wind, a sad cowboy song
This is a cover of a Gram Parsons song entitled Hickory Wind. It departs from the country rock original. I pretty much learned my recording software on this project and then put it away after my singer passed pre-pandemic. It does hint at my future arrangement flavoring. I feel called back to visit the song again. It’s currently cowboy-in-the-saddle raw, and far from fleshed out. Nonetheless, I’m compelled to carry on.
I’m after some articulated non-technical observations, reactions, interpretations, what-if suggestions, and maybe a nugget of inspiration.
Happy trails, PT
-
11 Replies
-
Hey paul!
First of all, I love that picture you attached! Is that by chance from your current travels? Amazing!
Secondly, thanks for sharing this beautiful recording. If I’m not mistaken, this is the first long-form track I think I’ve heard you share, which is nice because there’s so much room from an arrangement standpoint.
I love this song, and I think the vocal sounds so soulful and beautiful. I’m sorry about the loss of your friend. What a beautiful tribute to see the track through.
I wanted to mention a few ideas and things I heard on my first listen through, some big picture and some small things as well. as always take it with a grain of salt because they’re just my opinions, but maybe helpful as I’m listening with fresh ears.
Some of my main comments are about the instrument (specifically samples/MIDI) choices, and how they fit with the larger vibe of the production. The vocal in the beginning brought me right in. Great vibe! As the organ enters I’m further pulled into your organic, soulful, and down home world . But when the piano comes in at :16 it hit me as too digital sounding and it kinda took me out of the moment a little bit. I wonder if there’s a different piano sound you could find that fits the mood and blends with the organ a little bit more? Additionally I felt the same way about the guitar when it made its entrance at :25. the sound felt too “DI” to my ears, I wonder if there’s a way for you to process it so it feels more acoustic? I mention these two things because they took me out of the moment that you had so perfectly set up from the beginning of the song. And I wanted to stay in that world you had invited me into! I felt the same way again about the midi bass sound that entered around 1:59. Would it be possible to find a different sample? or even possibly have somebody record the part live?
One production/arrangement idea I had was when the heavy guitar riff comes in at around 1:00 I wonder if you could add a big country/open sounding bass drum to support those downbeats? Possibly even adding some more drums or percussion as the song builds? just an idea to maybe experiment with…But I also kind of dig that you didn’t add more drums, if you know what I mean…
One small thing I noticed, at around 1:28 when the background vocals “oohs” Make their entrance there is a downbeat that is missing the same fullness that the other ones have. I wonder if the bass is missing from that beat? just give that a listen.
Finally, I could imagine some sounds having a touch of reverb or space added to them. I feel like I remember you mentioning in one of the forums that you don’t care too much for reverb, and I definitely am coming from a place where I dig using reverb at times, but I thought that some of the electric guitar could use a touch of space. maybe not reverb per se but maybe just the feeling that it was in a room. I felt that the vocals might benefit from that as well.
Again, really awesome music and hopefully a couple of these ideas make sense!
Keep them coming!
Best,
Jesse
-
Hey Paul,
Real nice song. Sorry you lost your singer. This is a must-release.
Love all the instrumental building, especially when that nasty loud and surprising guitar blasts in. I’m here for it!
My main thought might be to add just a touch (or more!) of verb or slap back on the vocal so it sits a bit more in the mix. It feels especially stark in the opening verse where maybe that could add some glue to the organ.
And/or perhaps some low harmonic content under the organ would be nice, such as the guitar could help set up the song up with more energy and glue in the beginning. Otherwise, it’s off to the races after that!
Lastly, everything sounds pretty pristine… maybe adding some tape saturation (like JX37 or RC20) could add some nice analog-ol-timey warmth for the vibe.
Thanks for sharing!
J
-
Yeah Paul!! So great to hear this, and as others have mentioned, really sorry for your loss.
I totally “ditto” Jesse’s great ideas, and Jeremy’s too – they’ve really brought up all the same big picture thoughts that came to my mind too.
On the technical side (even tho it wasn’t asked for haha), I would bail the flanger on the distorted guitars and also try a more vintage amp sim with some nice spacious reverb decay. The solo guitar, you could try keeping the original tone and even keeping it dry if u like, to contrast the big wide non-flangy vintage verbed electric guitars.
Also for the acoustics, I’d love to hear more body on ’em. If I were mixing this song, I’d start by muting everything except the vocal, acoustics and bgvs, and make the best sounding record I could using just those elements. Like … I would mix as if those were the only 3 things in the song. Then once I love that version, I’d one-by-one add in the other elements to see how they fit in the the record as “support”
I do also – like jesse – feel the midi stuff is a bit jarring and I might experiment with different sounds or textures in those b-sections. Like, the marimba feels out of place for the vibe of the song for example. But the part is cool. Know what I mean?
Love the song and performance!! And am looking fwd to hearing how this progresses, man!
-
Jesse, Jeremy, and Dana,
Thank you for listening and commenting. I probably should not have posted that work yet. It was nowhere near ready for public consumption as mentioned in my “raw as a cowboy in the saddle ” preface. Perhaps that disclaimer wasn’t strong enough. I’m good with words, but prefer the subtle approach.
As you could imagine, I found it difficult to dive back into this project without feeling some discomfort. (You see, subtle)
So Jesse, I’m so glad you metaphorically, saw the window and then took the invitation into my interpretation of the song. That’s a success.
Jeremy, yea man, wide 🤘crunchy guitars!🤘
Dana, your suggestion to break the song down to its core and support that with the rest of the instruments flipped a synapse for me and I’m now aiming for the intensity with less bombast. Those flanged-distorto guitars are still there, and they seem even more country-death-metal dirgey because they no longer compete with the lead guitar lines. There’s a path in contrast to be mined in this song. The crunchy guitars against the mandolins, the heavy dirge feel without drums, though I have the idea to have my drummer play brushes on this but play like a half drunk Keith Richards speaks. You can’t understand a fucking word but he makes the point nonetheless. If the drummer stumbles around but bumps into the acoustic guitars occasionally, that may loosen the rigidity of the acoustics that really are the driver of time.
There’s an accapella intro now. It worked for Jay-Z.
And finally … not yet Jesse. I leave next week for my motorcycle trip in the southwest. That squished bug picture is from a previous trip to the Salton Sea.
PT
-
Paul! This arrangement is already feeling much better to me! I felt much more “in it” and I wanted to stay there.
I hope you have the best trip ever! Enjoy.
Best wishes,
Jesse
-
So cool, Paul – I LOVE the a cappella intro and was totally drawn in right away as the production developed. Hearing those bgvs louder was super fun – those are great!
For the heavy guitars, I always wish they could sustain alll the way till the next chord(s) so there were no blank spaces … like, once I hear them I don’t want them to go away! If I had my grubby knob-twisting hands on these tracks I would probably try adding some kind of “sustainer” type plugin or pedal or process on those crunchy cool guitars to experiment with elongating those held chords. Could be done via stretching them or something. I used to use Paul Stretch for this, an old incredible standalone free software that I’m not sure exists anymore. You could stretch a sound out for literal DAYS. Another thing I might try is playing the same part on a couple of new guitar tracks, but letting the strings sustain naturally. Treat those w/ the same type of amp sound and then blend them in with the existing guitars so the original guitars are still there in the mix, untouched, and the new guitars “carry the torch” when the orig guitars die out. Just spitballing ideas here, don’t mind me.
It would also be cool to utilize the accordion after the first instrumental bridge as a pad texture. So we hear it first as the arpeggiated bridge part and then when the next verse starts it turns down a bunch but does paddy chords so that the “new shiny object” introduced in the bridge doesn’t disappear but rather fades into the fabric of the song and arrangement.
~ [INCOMING STORYTIME MIXING ANALOGY…]
I’ve never described it before as such, but sometimes while mixing a song I imagine myself the listener as a guest arriving at a party. I arrive at the front door and it is quiet outside the house (I hit play but the song hasn’t started yet). The first person I meet at the door, the host, says hi and welcomes me into the foyer (the lead singer sings an opening line atop a minimal, inviting ambiance). As I’m led by the host toward the living room we bump into Paula and Travis who’ve just stumbled out of the hallway bathroom. They are loud and drunk and happy, and we all shake hands and hug (B3 organ and background vocals make their entrance .. the song develops). As we move past Paula and Travis into the kitchen I’m greeted by these two bearded lumberjack-looking twins, Ace and Johnny (chorus crunch guitars). Ace and Johnny stay in the kitchen doing Jågermeister shots while the host brings me and Paula and Travis out to the patio where there are a bunch of other partygoers watching a skinny hipster play an accordion (the accordion enters for the bridge turnaround section). Just as the hipster finishes his totally non-ironic ditty, there’s a brief moment of silence before Ace and Johnny suddenly burst through the kitchen door out onto the patio, their voices booming, their flannel lumberjack shirts smelling like hickory smoke. There are now a dozen partygoers on the patio talking, laughing, cheersing, etc (the song is in full swing, heading toward the final chorus)….
The point I’m trying to make is that as I meet people at the party they have my full attention, we’re introduced and chat for a sec – this is like a new instrument entering the arrangement of a song. In the mix, I often turn that new thing UP and draw the listener’s attention toward that new thing. As the song/party ensues and we meet new people/instruments, those people we met earlier in the night don’t LEAVE the party the moment we start a new conversation with someone else … rather, they usually fade into the background ambience. For example, I might go chat with the Accordion Hipster for a moment but in the background I’m still aware of Ace’s booming voice, Travis’ reedy laugh, Paula’s occasional hoots and whistles, and of course the host, who has now fired up a karaoke machine and is absolutely SLAYING “uptown girl” by Billy Joel.
Ok, that was interesting. And amusing, at least for me, lol. Hope that party analogy for mixing was somehow helpful, and keep up the awesome work, @-PT!
-
ur. heavy.
-
-
-
-
Dana,
That’s fucking brilliant. You managed to distill decades of music production down to an easily digestible nugget of high density inspiration. If your allegory doesn’t make a trade mag article or at the very least, the monthly highlights of MP, the world would be missing out. It’s that good.
The muse visiting me lately said … “Less is more,” … paused for a good long while ..
then continued with “and more is better.” I took that to more or less to mean don’t let grubby hands get at your (my) guitars and allow the sonic space that opens up as the crunchy fades to reveal the calm quiet behind the the aerial barrage delivered by ACE, your imaginary bombardier friend.
The quiet before the next explosive chord is either proof of the #1 rule in show biz, “Leave them wanting more.” or an effective terrorist psy-op leaving the listener aching for more incoming rounds. I believe the guitars got in your head. Fortunately, I know where my heart is.
Thanks
PT
-
Hahaha, awe, thanks so much man – I’m so glad it resonated and was as fun for you to read as it was for me to imagine and write down.
And heck yeah – always follow your heart! 💜⚡️🤘
-
Log in to reply.