Songcrafters.org

(Remastered 22/10/2021)

Here it is in all of its glory...

THIS is the song that Mrs R and I had decided was a suitable response to a request to "Upload something HAPPY, stat!!!!!!!!!"

I tried to record it back in 2013 when I wrote it. My muse of many years, who died herself in 2016, absolutely LOVED the idea... but...  when I sent her a demo she fell about laughing with "They'll all slit their wrists!!! As it is, even I'm tempted..."

Anyway, when I was asked to do "happy" a few weeks back, this was so OBVIOUSLY what was required in a mischievous "Wot?! I don't do happy, dontcha know?" kind of way.

I was rehearsing it in the living room. Mrs R was egging me on... we even considered changing the title to "Lala's Song". But then I wrote Hey Hey La La (https://songcrafters.org/forum/index.php?topic=29625.0) instead. Now that's done, we're back to this one...

I've always told a story about how this song was inspired by a Charlie's Angels episode. But I'm wrong! It wasn't... I must have been drunk...

It was actually a Moonlighting episode. What a program that was. Cybill and Bruce, yay! When she was the big star and he was the whacky unknown... When John McClaine was but a twinkle in his mommy's eye.

Moonlighting, Season 3, Episode 2. Check it out...

The first verse here was written as joke, while we were watching this back in 2013 (the boxset was one of Mrs R's birthday or chrimbo pressies - not sure we've got through it all yet! West Wing was another... haha... has anyone ever got to the end of that?)

Anyways...that there first verse pretty much describes the start of that episode.

But then, as with many of my songs, it took on a life of its own and went where the happy fairy of inspiration doth lead (the one guiding me likes it rough and real, you should hear what she's got me doing at the moment - "Edith Finally Gets It" a joyful barrel of laughs requiring much guitaring, shouting, and big drums).

I was calling this current offering "We Wait" for a long time, until we figured out that's what was making it feel even sadder.

This was recorded live, vocals and acoustic guitar, in the Broom Cupboard the other day. Then later geetar and bass overdubs were done without the add of a safety net or, indeed, a click track (I only did the overdubs because of a flubbed note on the best of twenty takes!!)

I have to say that this is not really the performance I had in mind, though it is very close to it. However, Mrs R, who is most definitely still with us - but claims it won't be long now - rates it highly.

So, ere tis, my lovelies...

This is POWERFUL !!!!

Your voice is just perfect. Right from the start this grabs you by the heart with both hands and it don't let go. The lyrics are pure poetry and when you sing "we wait so long" ...................we do !!!

Its nothing short of a masterpiece in my eyes and definitely my ears. I saw that you wrote She was dead when i put her in the ground last week and i just thought it was a throwaway joke not thinking for one minute there was an actual song out there.

and that last line "I was dead when we put her in the ground" What a twist

Fucking Mind blowing Andy !!!!!!!

Cheers  :D :D :D

And there really is a song called "Edith Finally Gets It" too LOL
It's on the BR1600 now, struggling with it's many geetars, guide bass and wotnot...

And then there was silence... a moment before I moved.

Poingnant, and powerful. A wonderful song.

Guitar track is beautiful, I couldn't spot the overdubs. Simple is sometimes the hardest to do because there's nowhere tho hide. Same with the vocal. I used to joke somewhere on here that just guitar and voice makes you doubly naked. Well, this was a pretty emotionally exposing experience, so you're right up there. 

Perfect Andy. Perfect.

Wow! you are giving me goosebumps Andy. Fabulous.

Wow nice one Andy, the intimacy of the recording lets the track spill into your head slowly until your brains emersed in the subject matter and then your totally caught in its grip

Excellent.

Yes Wow! Effective and moving song. Beautiful guitar-playing and earth-moving vocals. Gives me a tiny Rod Stewart-vibe but your voice is soo much manlier.

Terrific Andy, you should be so proud of this. This is a lesson in less is more. Those vocals and lyrics only need the gentlest of guiding along which is exactly what you have done. The lyrics are spine tingling and love the sound of those gentle guitars.

Mike

Gave me a Tom Waits vibe from the off. I absolutely love the sparseness, which is actually just the space to let the arrangement 'breathe' and the listener's focus to stay completely on the words and the beautiful guitar-work. Man... that is some lyric.

It's so affecting... so poignant.

Just incredible.

I can only agree with comments of everyone else here. I'm marvelling and the power of the songwriting and this time it's all about the songwriting rather than the production values as well. Stripped back, bare and poignant. Brilliant lyrics with a superb vocal performance.

I too get a Tom Waits vibe. Your voice reaches the same levels of emotion that he does, which is praise indeed in my book. Very well done.

Just brilliant! I love the contrast with minimalism of music and powerful and soulful lyrics and voice - it works so well. And what a voice you have! So fine songwriting and performance.

I too am getting a Tom Waits vibe from this except I can understand every word you're singing. This is so nice! Simplistic and powerful Andy. Your guitar and voice fills the room and demands attention. Well done and thanks for the details on how the song came about.

Farrell

Hehe

That's quite funny, and gratifying, you all saying Tom Waits.

When I wrote the first verse as jokey commentary to the Moonlighting episode we were watching, I did it as Tom Waits.

We thought that was amusing, and maybe it was going to go along that path in a Tom Waits kinda way - the plot of the Moonlighting episode was certainly a kind of off-the-wall Tom Waits story. (He thought he'd killed his wife in an argument, took her out in the woods and buried her, and was grieving muchly... Then he started getting menacing phone calls from her ;D So he went back and... GASP... she was gone!!! He goes to Maddie and David for help... ends up being the first murder victim etc etc...)

Anyway, when I sat down to evolve the song from the first verse, we got shoes under the bed and then there was no going back to the original story, I was just thinking "how would I feel?" ... another image that came to mind was the start of Sleepless In Seattle. Ok he doesn't actually fling himself down the hole before they fill it in... partly cos he's got a son to look after, but that's what he felt like, and his friends and colleagues were trying to dig him out of the metaphorical hole... In fact, the "we wait" was probably from that character...

But in the end, I didn't want my character to be "redeemed" by the end of the song, I wanted the full depth of despair of ten years and still not finding how to let go, but knowing I have to carry on somehow... and the little twist of "she" to "I" was just kinda fab and obvious... and did exactly what I wanted.

SO... by now, it's an Andrew Russe song, and we sang it in an Andrew Russe "meaningful" voice... and... oh... dear.. oh... dear... oh... dear...  ;D ;D ;D (this is back in 2013 - it was going to be a quick win of a new song to post while I was doing some band thing taking weeks and weeks and weeks...)

It was awful everytime I recorded it...

Who loves Bobby Goldsboro's Honey?
I do. That recording is fabulous, apparently they got it first take.
It doesn't sound daft, or stoopid, or milking the emotion too much...
(I imagine second take was awful!!  ;D)

Now, who's tried to do Honey themselves?
Yep, this was like that...

So we filed it.
But I love love LOVE this one. More than some of the others that have elicited the same kinds of response from people (I Like This Girl, Anyway, Bring Your Daydreams To Me, etc).

So I kept coming back to it.

I tried speeding it up a bit - and this one is indeed faster than it was... it improved, but I couldn't lose the mawkishness (="sentimental in an exaggerated or false way").

And then I did the Tom Waits impersonation again sat here fiddling with it. And I thought, that's it, some of his songs are SO... but you never think "sentimental nobhead"

I wasn't sure, though... so I asked Mrs R if it would seem stupid doing it like that... she didn't think so.

So I've been rehearsing it like that for several weeks while doing other stuff.

When I recorded it, it wasn't nearly as Tom Waits as I wanted. But she thought it was enough.

She's been sending it to her friends as "Andrew's Tom Waits song"  ;D

Interesting, great to hear the back story behind this one.

It reminded me of Georgia Lee by Tom Waits, a song that always brings tears to my eyes. You damn near just about did the same here.

i deliberately didn't mention mr waits in my comment but aye there is a wee tad of him in there but jings it's all you andy, a pearl mate.

_wow

Woah! Geir - good to hear from you,  :) :) :) :) :) :)
I was wondering where you were... you were in the back of my mind when I started recording again a few weeks back. "I wonder what Geir would think of this?" ;D

Great performance & absolutely awesome...

For me....I wasn't sure at first if she really died....I thought maybe she left...But upon reading through I guess she did & the "letting go" or inability to "let go" of her after she is gone, is the underlying theme.

Brilliant....

A round of applause for Mrs R - she's got great taste!

Late to the party it seems. I to enjoyed  Moonlighting too whey  back when Life was more hectic and complicated with youth. Did you see the mockumentry on the unknown Bruce Willis  about his life and how he had dipped his toes into everything ????It was about the time he did that album any way enough about Moonlightiyand back to the song. I've been listening to a lot of Tom waits while painting  the undercoat and gloss on the stairs mostly Orphans and the story of the song Jumping out at me from each track,just like yours has.i loved it Bravo sir
Ps I should really read the other comments before commenting ????

Wow. Blimey.  Words fail me.  Brilliant stuff.  I will try to be more erudite next time I listen to this - which will be soon.

Paul

Back for some more ... i forgot to applaud last time bravo!

Perfect song, catches you from the first line, tom waits will steal it from you if you let him hear it ????

Hehehe... It's not the first time I've stolen the "vibe" from Tom Waits (there's a thing called Somedays on here somewhere that was a direct attempt at writing a Tom Waits song - maybe even nicking the chords/structure - it's a blues after all - from a song on Mule Variations)

... I've been quiet for the last week or two because I'm struggling with the next song (nearly solved :D) ... I very nearly gave up for a bit and recorded another "death" acoustic song. Slightly different to this. It's from 1994 (in fact, there's still 4 or 5 songs from that year that I want to do, and it's already produced several on here, Sleeping With The Ghost, Warriors, Elizabeth's Room).

BUT ... the reason for commenting here... I just took delivery of a matched pair of compact cardioid condenser mics... (Rode M5s) ... OH. MY. GOODNESS.

I've been threatening to buy something like it for YEARS and YEARS... but it seemed a little excessive.

What I've been doing on these "live" acoustic jobbies is stick the vocal through a large Condensor (Rode NT1000), then use a pair of SM57s for the guitar. One on the soundboard, one on the fingerboard. I've done this on many things, it's what I did here for She Was Dead. It results in... well, ok... but it's often a mixing nightmare, and I'm never ever happy...

I've been blaming the room... and just putting up with what I can do...

Yesterday, when the M5s arrived, I set up in the "live singer-songwriter" position with the M5s instead of the 57s... and just slapped down one of the next songs, unrehearsed, to test it out ... it might be a fluke, and I'll never be able to repeat it... but HOLY F...!!! (Flip)

When Mrs R got home, I played it to her... she was "oh my goodness... I can't usually hear a difference when you buy new stuff, but this... wow"

I got some rehearsing to do, and the band thing to complete first, but watch this space!! 8) 8) 8) 8)