Studio Blog: State of the Union.

It needs to be said that I'm still buzzing off of the success of my TRAF set, partly because you can YouTube the living hell out of it! Thanks to David Oleniacz for:



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I think my favorite thing is the two crotchety guys who full-on have a conversation about which way to go while standing in front of the camera, and nearly crash into it while heading past it. Like, "Damned if some kid on stage bein' filmed by some flim-flam flappin' flibflob is gonna tell us where to stand. We beat England for you!"

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Today, Mark and I had a whole rundown of the remaining candidates. We determined a few things:

I am over "Afterglow." I don't know what I hoped to accomplish with that song, and I feel like it captures the weakest attempt I've ever made at salvaging joy from the wreckage of a regrettably premature encounter. RETIRED.

"Astoria" needed a little work. We negotiated a bit on the sustained note at the end of the chorus, and getting the theme back in between the first and second verse. What was great was that Mark was frank and honest about where the song fell apart for him, and we found a solution instead of scrapping it.

So much for "So Much For Us." I think the bug up my butt about recording this because it didn't make the last album is made moot by Mark's assertion that it is suffering from too much bridge. Looking at it objectively, I agree -- if you're going to have a bridge, it should expand on the song, but looking at it now it feels like a lot more lyric to repeat the sentiments that were already there. Which, in fairness to the person I was in the moment that I wrote that song, probably what conversing with me on that subject was like: lots of reiterations on one monotonous theme. I'm going to try to rework it, but it's sidelined for now.

"Jerk" is a kick-ass song! You pretty much knew that.

"Here Goes Nothing" is better than Andy thinks it is. Andy Mac and I co-wrote the title track for this album, and I think it's one of my favorite crush songs since "Under My Nails."

"January" can start eight different ways. We looked at a lot of variants on the open, and it's still up in the air as to which one we'll use. It all depends on how we end:

"Home" does not need to be changed to sound less like other songs. I get a lot of flak from other singer-songwriters about small phrases that stick out to them, but after reworking it, Mark was like, "That's stupid. Put it back the way it was. Nobody is going to think that." Thanks, Mark.

"Hey Hey Hey" is not that big a deal. OK, it's a huge deal. But it's a bigger deal that we don't make a big deal out of it. Right?

"Enough" is better than I think it is. I'd been wish-washing on it, then Mark got enthusiastic. I may turn it into a duet.

"Boy Meets Girl" is recordable. I swear, guys, we're gonna get a good version of this song. I will not rest until it happens.

So there you go. Currently we're looking at this as a 10-song record:

Calling You Out
Wonderful Lie
Hey Hey Hey
Enough
Astoria
Boy Meets Girl
Jerk
Here Goes Nothing
Home
January

I can't wait to start delving into this stuff.

Next week, we're going to go in and try to get basic guitar and vocal tracks for 3 or 4 songs at once, to experiment with our process a bit. Wouldn't you love to listen to this stuff as it happens? Stay tuned to find out how you can!