The Story Behing a Song
Song: Breathless.
Album: Any Place But Now.
There are some songs that put you in the right frame of mind when you are working on the sound of the album. The idea of using piano as one of the main instruments was just right with this song, Breathless.
Jordi Casadesus (producer) transposed my fingerpicking to piano and we started working from there making some changes on the fly to the song’s structure: A new intro, more repetitions on the second chorus and, my favorite one, Jordi plays a 3/4 piano pattern over the 4/4 beat, which starts at the second part of the song, creating a beautiful loop until it ends, abruptly.
So we got everything set up but the sound, something that we knew might take a while but we were sure would definitely freak you out. The magnificence of sound of the piano didn’t suit it at all though. It was too big, too classic and too clean. Jordi decided to use a mute rail in front of the hammers making it quieter and it worked surprisingly well. He went a step further, setting up all the microphones in front of the piano capturing all the imtricate little cracking sounds from the pedals and the quiet hammering of the keys and hammers. Something you can hear very clearly on “No Man’s Land” intro. I love the melancholy that this muted piano brings out in all the songs, as it tries to reach its own genuine sound.
Well, I don’t want to make these posts too long, just tell you a few curiosities of each song, but if there’s something you’d like to know, just write your questions on the comments below.
Take care people!
