Buy the Truth

Howdy all,

I haven't posted here in a while. Collegio is crackin down now. But I thought i'd stop in and post this new song. It's pretty fun to play but that doesn't necessarily mean it's fun to listen to. I was wondering if you guys had any critiques of the lyrics or the arrangement in general. Most of you here have a keen sense of bad writing. Thanks ahead of time

[YOUTUBE][/YOUTUBE]

The lyrics:

Step into my life

It's empty, so vacant, so grand

All these things of mine

They're priceless, they're precious, they're hollow

I have halls, I have rooms

They're empty, so empty, so empty

Ornate walls, custom clothes

They're not me, they're not me

Welcome to my life

It's empty, so vacant, so grand

All these things I own

They own me, they own me

I see endless catalogs

I would walk away in a minute

I hear myself say

Set it free, buy the truth

See my journals, see my chairs

They're empty, so empty, so empty

All these pages boxed away

They go nowhere

I see endless "How's your day"

I would walk away in a minute

I hear myself say

Set it free, buy the truth

Take this house, I'm almost home

Take these things, I'm almost home

Tell my wife, I'm almost home

Tell her now, I'm almost home

All my life I'm going home

awesome singing and playing

the structure is unimpeachable

very clever video

this is an awesome effort

on the downside, it sounds just like Dave Matthews (unless you want to sound just like him)

the lyrics are fairly predictable. yes, i like the irony of "buy the truth" and "tell my wife i'm almost home." i'm just not convinced that the speaker understands the irony of "buying" into the truth and "wife" and "home." i get the sense of a speaker who only half understands the commercialization of emotions, and isn't quite self-aware enough to realize that.

overall effect: a gorgeous song; i will listen to it several times again

DAMN! ah I'm trying to break out of the Dave Matthews sound. I suppose to someone who isn't a fan of the genre, it might sound really similar. Or maybe perhaps I'm just not diversifying my sound enough.

Anywho thanks for the input. Hmm I'll put some thought into how I can make the speaker's ending resolve more convincing.

hey, this is a A+ song ... i would be HAPPY to write something like this

Bravo!

Thanks guys. I'm pretty happy with this one, but I always get frustrated with the Dave Matthews comparison. It's not like Dave has a monopoly over weird acoustic sound. But I suppose if it still sounds too much like him from outside ears, it's something I should work on.

Thanks again

First the song...

I really like it, mostly. I love the introductory lines... it's a well drawn picture... you can kind of see the guy doing the grand tour for the cameras... and here is the empty ball room and here the empty banquet room.

I wasn't so sure about the "I see endless 'How's your day?'" verse... it seems to go a little vague. It doesn't have the nice tight focus as the rest of the song. I can see what it's getting at but it seems to dampen the momentum a little, lyrically.

The last verse puts it all together neatly, juxtaposing the emotionally empty earthly home with a presumed eternal home with his departed loved one. I was just worried that it might be, in a sense, too neat. Certainly the juxtaposition of the emotionally empty earthly palace and the presumed eternal home with his loved one is perfectly on point. On the other hand, maybe this is how it has to end. We can reject stuff because it's too perfect, too on-point, too resolved -- but ultimately we're talking about packing an emotional world into a 4 minute song and maybe a verse that sums things up neatly is not a bad thing. I'm in my wary, early morning mode... maybe if I was in my late in the day, sloppy sentimental mode (no, I don't still drink but those emotional patterns may linger ) this thing would hit me like a ton of bricks and I'd think perfect was perfect. I dunno.

Anyhow, I think, overall, it's very strong, nicely observed, winningly delivered.

And speaking of the delivery... I gotta ask (and maybe it's already been answered, in critique threads I usually write first, then read, so I don't get my opinions colored by those of others)... was this all done with an echo-looper? If so, that's mighty impressive, seems to me. I wanted to concentrate on the song, so I didn't go through paying attention to what part came from where; maybe it was a mix of conventional overdub and looping or something.

Whatever, I thought the video presentation was a lot of fun and very winning. I even liked the somewhat goofily theatrical camera mugging at the end... a kind of, What'd you think? I think it was a keeper-kind of look that fit the proceedings nicely.

Very impressive.

PS... If Buy the Truth is the title, I'm not crazy about that. I don't see the buying thing that centrally, actually. I mean, sure we have the juxtaposition of a man who has earthly wealth but seems to long for the most simple human pleasures lost... but his wealth is merely set-up, I think for his realization that without an emotional core, it's nothing...

Thanks blue for such an in-depth review. You one of the two different ways to look at the song. The line "endless "How's you day" was sort of to indicate an estranged relationship. In this respect, his wife is very much alive and the ending lines are to indicate that home is not a place, but rather an idea. Perhaps it doesn't pack the "emotional wallop" that the other way you could interpret it may. Home as an ethereal end. My reasoning for leaving it open was that some might consider the latter interpretation too "sappy" as you said.

I did this all in one take without any "after-the-fact" overdubs. Everything was done with a boss loopstation, and an echo effect for my voice. SO essentially that's how I'd play it live. Thanks for the compliment. It took a few takes to get it tight sounding.

As for the title, it was originally called "Welcome to my Life" but that seemed to shallow. I agree that "Buy the Truth" isn't the primary theme of the song, but it's the larger irony of the song; that he could be so deluded that he might "buy the truth" or that he realizes how foolish that is. I'm not fully sure I like that as the title either, so it's negotiable.

Thanks again

Did I say 'sappy'? Well, no matter, I love a good tearjerker.

As someone who did a very different live echo loop thing for years before we had all this fancy technology -- I started with a single 7.6 digital delay with no dedicated looping functions other than the then-unheard of ability to 'freeze' the loop -- I have to say that that level of 'production' (I guess you could say) in a live loop presentation is techically pretty impressive. And I didn't even notice you were looping things until I started finding myself thinking, Wait, is there an 'underdub' going on here?

Once again... I guess I was into something before its time...

Sweet Jesus, what a gorgeous song!

...And all done on a loop station!!

Personally, I liked the different images and insinuations in the lyrics.

I think sometimes it depends on the listeners personal experiences, whether certain images or phrases work or not, but your explanation seems to line up with what I "got" from it, so I'd say it works.

As for the Dave comparisons...I've heard a lot of people with a clean, folky acoustic sound, long before Dave was ever popular. I wouldn't worry about it, unless you start emulating him vocally. This is an A+ song, as mentioned, and I wouldn't change a thing.

Do you have a MySpace page, or website, or anything to market your work? Do you have CDs available? I only ask, because your work is definitely marketable, and I'd personally love to buy a CD if you have them. If not, please find a way to share your music with the world, it's definitely worth sharing.

This is going to sound "sappy", as you put it, but it's going to be cool hearing you on the radio in a couple years, being able to say "I heard him when he was posting to YouTube in college...". I don't say that lightly...If KT Tunstall can make a living on a loop station, there's no reason you can't as well...

Oh, I like the original title ("Welcome to My Life") better, but little matter.

Awesome job!

This is excellent.No I didn't hear Dave Mathews here---I enjoyed everything about this except your funny look into the camera at the end -- I loved the way you looped everything and am very interested in how you did this and what you used. Of course the sound of the instrumentation looped is great too---you did a great job in getting a good sound. Great lyrics too...Please let me know

Thanks very much sir. So here's a picture of my pedals:

(it skips to the next picture for some reason. To go back, just click "previous" in the upper righthand)

I used the line switcher and the equalizer for my mic when I run it through the Loopstation. That's how I was able to loop the shaker. The DD-7 on the far right was for the echo effect on my voice. All the guitar work was just looping the first phrase and building on it slowly throughout the song, adding harmonies one phrase at a time if that makes sense. The hardest part with doing songs this way is that they can get really long since it requires three of four passes in a loop to get all the harmonies built up. Also making leads in a really short loop like this one are dangerous because they can make the song too monotonous and repetitive. Hope that answers your question.

Thanks everyone for all the awesome feedback!

Yeah, that was a fun listen.

Isn't it grand to have all of this cool technology at our disposal to help us create multi-layered excellence like this?

How about this for the title?

Nothing wrong with that! Indie, baby!

I'm actually working on a project with a local Indie artist myself.

Felt I needed some experience Producing, and growing as an artist, so I offered my "services" for free...

If you were local, I'd totally do the same for you, but it's probably nothing you can't do on your own. That recording is incredible for YouTube!

Seriously, if you make it (a CD), I (and "they") will buy.

Great performance! Excellent Vocals/Guitar!! I love the layering. You did it very well. I'm big on rhyming in songs so I missed that a bit but it's no biggie. Usually repetitive songs are boring but certainly not in this case...

Not to be the troll topping old threads, but I redid this song with piano, guitar, and cello. I would like to share it with you guys in hopes that you might appreciate the rendition. I received the majority of the constructive feedback the first time around so don't feel pressured to say anything more (unless of course you have some critiques, all are welcome).

Hope you listen, and hope even more that you like it.

[YOUTUBE][/YOUTUBE]

Awesome song and performance! I didn't see the original the first go-round, but I listened to it twice while reading the posts before getting to the "updated" version and listening to it twice, too. I thoroughly enjoyed both, but especially the one with cello and piano.

Nice melody and vocal delivery, IMO, and I thought the bridge fit nicely with the rest of the song.

Thanks for sharing this with us!

wow ...

that second rendition really has something ... very, very nice

the first time around was great, but not quite unique

but this second one ... man ... you kick ass

Thanks a lot, gentlemen. It's supremely satisfying to hear good things about this version considering the work I put into it. It really makes it worth it.

Thanks again.

P.S. it was a pain in the a$$ doing all that with the slacks, shirt, and tie on. Especially having to wear it day after day (and washing them, of course )

Edit: Also you can download a hi-fi version here

http://www.soundclick.com/bands/page_songInfo.cfm?bandID=711721&songID=7234604