Making "Division Street," Part Two: The Winter Line

Before I got down to the business of recording "Division Street," I decided it was time to up my studio game. I spent hours and hours reading everything I could about recording and mixing. And I decided to upgrade some of my gear, along with doing some "on the cheap" acoustic work on my studio room.

A few years ago, after I switched from ProTools to Logic, I replaced my Digidesign 002 with an Apogee Ensemble. I've been very happy with it - it has very clean, very decent pre-amps, and it integrates wonderfully with my Mac. So I knew I was OK in that department. I still had the 002 sitting around, however, so I pulled it out, cleaned it up, and sold it on Craigslist. With the money from that, I first purchased a pair of small diaphragm condenser microphones. I went with the MXL603s Stereo Matched Pair, which was well reviewed for the price range. I was considering getting a new large diaphragm condenser to replace mine - a Studio Projects C1 LDC Microphone - but thankfully, I tested the waters by asking around over at Gearslutz.  It turns out, there's a company called JJ Audio that does microphone mods. For $150, I could get my C1 modded, instead of buying a new mic. After listening to the mic shoot-outs posted on his site, I opted for the mod, and I've been very happy with the results.

So now, armed with some better microphones, and an increased knowledge of how to use them and the rest of my gear, I was ready to get to the fun part - making music!

"The Winter Line" started off as a simple B-minor to D-Major riff. No words, no arrangement. It was about as bare-bones as you can get. Bm - D - walkdown G-F#-D - A - D - G was the entire progression. If you are interested in playing it, I should say that I had a capo on the 7th fret, so the chords I was playing, fingering-wise, were Em - G - C-B-G - D - G - C.

I recorded this, quick and dirty style, then pulled out a notebook and listened to it looping over and over while I thought of a melody. Pretty soon, I had the first verse:

Down in the dark, we rolled away
The last of the Winter Line
And Carrie you, you spoke a word
And everything disappeared
I waited, here for you
Oh for your lovely face
I'd trade it, all for you
All for your lovely face

I was pretty happy with that. Still didn't have a chorus or anything, but that usually comes later for me, once I figure out what the song is about. With this song, I decided to try a bit of a lyrical challenge - I would construct a second verse that would have to make sense, while rhyming internally with the first verse wherever possible. No easy task! Eventually, this is what I got:

Down in the park, we throwaways
The passed over ones arrive
I carried you, through the world
when everything disappeared
I waded, into you
Into your breath and grace
I'll make it, up to you
Oh on your wedding day

Not bad! I failed in a couple places - I ended up re-using "disappeared," for example, and some of the last lines don't really internally rhyme, but I felt it was pretty successful all told. 

Now I needed a chorus, a bridge, and then I would be ready for some arranging. Once I had the chords for the chorus (with the capo, G-D-G-C-G-D-C), coming up with the melody wasn't too hard. But I was having trouble with the words. I had the 'response' lines, but there was a single word that needed to be repeated three times in each line. Through mumbling around, I was singing "war, war, war," but it just didn't seem to fit the vibe of the song. I eventually changed it to "love, love, love." Still a bit simple - more general than I usually like, but it fit the song well enough.

When I first put the song together, it was OK, but a bit dull - fairly monochromatic. I decided to drop the chorus from everywhere except the very end, and introduce some big dynamic shifts, to give the song more drive and purpose. It was also at this point that I composed the bridge (which in the absence of a chorus until the end, might be mistaken for a chorus!). Here I went for a slight twist on perhaps the most classic progression of all - I-IV-V (the 'twist' was only having the vocals start on the V instead of the I). Using the banjo, mandolin, and guitar, I still wanted to be able to make a subtle nod to African music in the bridge, and this progression, so common in Congolese Soukous, was just the ticket. In the end, I was very pleased with the result.