The Elm City Council

Cubicle Songs Episode 1!

Tune in every Wednesday at 1pm for more guests, more tunes, and general office shenanigans.

www.cubiclesongs.com

“Some People Said” - Acoustic version of another new tune. Recorded at my rehearsal space on 2/6/2011.  Believe it or not, this song was inspired by reading a biography of Cornelius Vanderbilt.  I blogged about it earlier, but one of the things that really struck me was how people living at that time (late 1700s to the mid/late 1800s) lived at a time of PROFOUND change when the old ways of living and working were evaporating and the new ones were not yet solidified.  This really resonated with me because I think we’re kind of living in a time like that now with computers/internet/mobile computing/social media changing the ways we work and live.  Anyway, I decided to tell a story set in the mid 1800s…hope you dig it…

An acoustic version (and world premiere) of my new song, “The Voice Of My Heart”.  Recorded at my rehearsal space on 2/6/2011.  This was probably the second time I ever played it straight through, so there are a couple mistakes.  The biggest is the second line of the second verse, which should say, “On God, on love, on you” instead of “On God, on art, on you”, which is what I sing on this video.

Anyway, it’s a bit rough in spots, but I was feeling the spirit, so I hope you like it.

-ML

Blast from the past…”Sometimes A Girl” was the first time I ever met David Jamison and, simultaneously, the first time we ever made music together.  I had booked a single day in the studio to record 10 folk/country/blues inspired tunes and David came to play drums on the suggestion of the producers, Tommy Mokas and Nick Rosenthal.

We had a blast playing together and, as a direct result of this session, he ended up joining my classic rock inspired project, The Beat Hounds, in which we played together a lot, became good friends, went on tour, did more recording, etc., etc., etc.  While I liked a lot of the acoustic-driven stuff that we did that day back in 2009, I didn’t end up releasing the album in any meaningful way because I was focusing on The Beat Hounds. 

Anyway, I wanted to share this again, partially because I think it’s kind of a fun tune, but also because it’s an audio/video document of what has become a really fruitful musical partnership.  And it also points in the direction that we’re going to explore for this next phase…although not necessarily in the way you might think. 

I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately and I’ve come to the conclusion that, at a very high level, there are 2 types of songs in the rock/pop world:

1.) Songs where the specific arrangement/performance is not crucial.

2.) Songs where the specific arrangement/performance is absolutely essential.

A great example of the first one might be “Blowing In The Wind” by Bob Dylan.  Whether or not that’s your style of music, you’d be pretty hard pressed not to conclude that it’s a friggin’ amazing song.  And the thing is that you could come to that conclusion by hearing almost anybody perform it as long as that performer didn’t absolutely and completely suck.  Some performances are better than others, some arrangements might be cooler, some ill-advised…but the song itself would come across loud and clear as being a good song in the hands of almost any decent musician.

A great example of the second type of song might be Whole Lotta Love by Led Zeppelin.  There’s a reason that you don’t hear it covered very often and, when you do, it’s usually not that much fun: the sound of THAT band playing THAT arrangement with THOSE tones is a huge part of what makes that tune great.  In any other hands, it’s just not the same.  And not in a minor way.  There are tunes in this second category that lose almost their entire appeal in the wrong hands in a way that a song like Blowing In The Wind doesn’t.

It’s an easy knee-jerk reaction to say that the first type of songs are “better” songs and, while I understand the position, some of my very favorite music of all time falls more into the second category.  When an artist or a group of artists can create a piece of music that is amazingly powerful and beautiful when a specific group of people perform it in a specific way, how is that worse?  (Radiohead, anyone?)  It’s not worse…it’s just less…I don’t know…”universally applicable” is maybe a good way to put it.  Who’s better - Led Zeppelin or Bob Dylan?  There’s gonna be a lot of different answers on that question and there will certainly be sizable amounts of people in both camps.  But it’s pretty inarguable that there are a hell of a lot more awesome Bob Dylan covers out there than there are good Led Zeppelin covers.  And, in my opinion, it’s not cuz his songs are “better”…they’re just not as specific in their performance requirements.  (One could argue that that is one of the required qualities of a great song and I can understand that point of view, but I’m just thinking about it in terms of what I have enjoyed listening to over the course of my life.  And, from that point of view, I have a lot of love for both.)

Anyway, the goal for this next step is to focus on the first category of songs.  The Beat Hounds’s debut album was project focused on the second type of song.  I can tell you from experience (both bitter and beautiful) that, if those songs aren’t played exactly right, they just don’t connect in the way I want them to.  But, on the flipside, when the musicians are all on the same page and we’re all doing the right thing together, they can hit HARD and be an absolute blast to perform live.

All of which is great (especially if you have a tightly knit band with steady personnel), but I also want to experiment with the other type of songs.  I want to write the kind of songs that can be powerful in almost anybody’s hands.  And then I want to work with all our talented friends to give those songs really awesome arrangements.  Cuz…it seems to me that maybe that is a powerful combination when done right…  That’s when you end up with the kind of track that anybody can learn how to play on guitar with their friends, but they still want your version cuz it’s ALSO got the arrangement/band chemistry magic…  (“You Can’t Always Get What You Want” is almost always a good tune, but the Stones did it better than anybody else ever did…The Beatles…etc.)

Anywho, we’ll probably touch on some country and blues inflected stuff because I love that stuff (and this tune certainly shows both), but I’m not interested in limiting ourselves by genre.  The only rule for this next phase is this: it HAS to work when I play it and sing it on one acoustic guitar.  We may not release it on record that way, but, if I can’t get onstage by myself and put the song across to an audience, it’s not a song we’ll be working on.

So…we’re gonna set sail here (if you’ll pardon the extended metaphor) and see what kinds of audio adventures we can get into.

-Mat Lenny

This is a new version of an old tune of mine called “Evelyn”. The lyrics and most of the melody remain the same, but I am playing around with the chords and it seems to be giving the tune a cool new feeling. On listening to it, I actually hear a couple more changes I’m gonna make to it, which I’ll record and share soon.

This is part of what I hope will be a series of videos where I share the process of songwriting, revising, etc.

Sorry, by the way, for the crappy video quality…low light and my camera don’t get along so well…(plus I’m a crappy videographer).

-ML

“Every Single Day” (potential new title “Dreaming Of You”?) performed live earlier this evening at the Red Lion on Bleecker Street.  I’ve been working on writing some acoustic based songs and, with some help from David Jamison on this one, on re-imagining some of my electric tunes for an acoustic setting.  This tune, in particular, took some surprising twists as we moved it from its electric, riff-based origins to an acoustic version.  The single biggest thing was that, all of a sudden, I wanted to hear fuller, more definite chords and the chorus melody really wanted to move from its original minor to a more soaring major.  The original chorus riff actually then ended up being used in the new bridge section (formerly a guitar solo).

Anyway, I think the tune is different enough now that I think I’m gonna start calling it “Dreaming Of You” with its electric sister tune still being called “Every Single Day”…but I didn’t think of that until I already uploaded the video, so…

Hope you enjoy and sorry for the extremely dim lighting…(oh yeah…and this was the first time I tried this version of the tune out in public…for whatever it’s worth…) Thanks to Sean Hunting Morse for the guitar loan.  Oh…and gotta love people who don’t turn off their friggin’ cell phones when listening to quiet acoustic music…sigh…