1. What about the Covid-19 lockdown reignited your passion for music and led to the creation of ‘Life’ after a 20-year hiatus?
In 2020 I bought an Epiphone Casino because I wanted the same guitar used on Sgt. Peppers. At the same time I was starting to play around with GarageBand on my iMac. You know with the shutdown we were all stuck at home so I built a very simple home studio to play around in. I couldn’t believe how easy it was to record using a computer instead of having to use tape like in the past. The first song I wrote was “The Lows…” and I played it to a few people and I was strongly encouraged to write more. From there 20+ years of pent up music began to flow out. “Life” is my second album since coming back and it is the continuation of where I left off with 2023’s “Back To The Start: The Album”.
2. The Beatles, especially Paul McCartney, have been major influences for you. Can you share a specific song or moment from their catalog that significantly impacted your music?
February 7, 1984 which represented The Beatles 20th anniversary of coming to America was the ignition point for me wanting to write songs. Many radio stations were playing Beatles music all day and it was that day that I first picked up a guitar as well as sat down at the piano. From there, my Mom took me out to get my first album, “The Beatles 20 Greatest Hits”, and I played it 24 hours a day. Every couple of weeks she would then run me to the used record store and I was allowed to pick out another album. I got them in the order they were released and I remember the day I brought home the album “Revolver”. I was just blown away at what The Beatles did with that album and then “Sgt. Peppers”. That was the moment that I realized music didn’t have to all fit into one box and that creative notion set me on fire. You can hear that on both my albums but more so on “Life”.
3. ‘Life’ features a rich blend of sounds. Can you describe your creative process for this album, particularly in choosing instruments and arrangements?
“Life” started during the final mixing sessions of “Back To The Start”. “Coming Home” and “Life” were the first two songs I wrote for it. Funny enough they also became the bookends of this album. After getting back into the studio with my last album, I was becoming more confident in my abilities as well as more experimental in pushing my vocal/harmonies and my guitar playing. I was also becoming more experienced with understanding today’s recording techniques even though a lot of the tools I used utilized classic consoles like Abbey Road in the 60/70’s.
“Life” has many traits to it from Rock to Ballad to Psychedelic; you name it. My instrument mix didn’t change much as I was still heavy on drums, bass, guitar and piano but I feel I explored more with the string arrangements and brass arrangements used on this album. I always tell people to hear the real me, you need to listen to the whole song. My song “Life” for example starts very simply with vocals, guitars, and drums but by the 2nd verse, piano comes crashing in as well as some strings. Finally by the end of the song you have a full string and brass section plus a choir of friends and family singing along.
4. How did collaborating with Sean Weyers influence the sound of ‘Life’?
Sean's background is very acoustic and folk based. It was quite interesting when we first started working together on my last album. While he had engineered and mastered many types of music, he really jumped all in with my direction and it shows. When it came to “Bulletproof” I remember asking him if he would be interested in trying to write together and he said yes. The night we wrote “Bulletproof” we must’ve spent 2+ hours not getting anything done. We just weren’t clicking but I stumbled upon the guitar chords for foundation of it and away we went.
Sean gets me and my vision for my music so writing together pushed both of us to utilize each other's backgrounds. “Bulletproof” could’ve been a real folksy sounding song if he would’ve done it on his own and it might have been more of a rock song if I had done it on my own but the space where we met in the middle gave us what it is today. When you look at our other collaboration “You Ain’t The One”, I may have pushed it a little more my way…
5. How has your approach to songwriting changed from your early work with "Drifting Apart" to the tracks on ‘Life’?
Absolutely. Back then it was so simple; was the song going to be a guitar or piano song and what could I fit on a 4, 8, or 16 track tape. That was it. Today, most of my songs have both guitar and piano arrangements and could have multiple different guitar and keyboard arrangements plus string and brass as well as background harmonies. It’s much more complex when you look at the finished product but they all start with either a guitar or piano. Having the luxury of not being constrained by tape and track counts today have allowed me to push in new directions I couldn’t back then. So short answer, yes it has changed dramatically.
Written by Natalie Greener
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