Wild At Heart (2010)
This EP was recorded in the first months after I moved to New York in 2009. I had just gotten my first MacBook and I was learning how to use Logic Express. For these reasons I consider this EP to be a "demo" because I was still learning how to use new software as I was writing these songs. I had just entered the jazz vocal program at CCNY and this was the last solo project I worked on before I started a band, Birch & The Tiger, later that year and focused on that primarily for the following 2 years.
The title of this EP is an homage to my favorite David Lynch movie. The full title was originally "Wild at Heart and Weird on Top". But somehow over the years it got shortened to just Wild at Heart. Essentially it is reflecting on my wild romantic passionate desires, but how they are never fully realized because I'm just such a damn weirdo. Its also kind of about nature and feeling like a feral part of it, just living life growing like a weed.
This ep is actually really experimental. On every song I am trying something new and experimenting with a new production technique or a concept or just generally trying new things. It is very raw and a little embarassing in some places but I still love it.
Software Used
Logic Express
Hardware Used
macbook pro, midi controller
Song Descriptions - LYRICS
Fire Fly!
So this might be the first song I actually made on logic. Its cringey because this is the only time that I built a song around a stock beat and a prearranged selection of synth sounds. Honestly, 90% of the production is entirely mine but the main beat the drives the song was not my creation and it's so annoying. I've heard this beat on random youtube videos and it hurts so much. But I was honestly just playing around learning the program and I happened to write a pretty decent song so I kept it. It was inspired by the fireflies that I used to see when I first moved to the Bronx and my own romantic passion that was like everpresent. Its the first time that I officially tried to write a house song.
Innocence and Opiates
This song uses a combination of original beats and deeply altered stock beats so I can comfortably say its entirely my production. I was trying to create this weird rap song that was inspired by the duet stylings of this Ethiopian duo that I used to listen to all the time. It was the first "rap" song that I did. It's about when I dream of the perfect relationship but even within the dream, I'm realizing that its a dream but not being able to fully control the direction of it and feeling sad that I'm gonna wake up and I'll have to face reality.
Air
This song was a great accomplishment. This was the first time that I wrote a song but did not write the lyrics. My friend Vanessa Dees posted her poem called "Elemental" to Facebook one day and I asked her if I could use the poem to create a song. I literally built this song line by line in a completely freestyled manner. I made one beat and one bassline and built everything else step by step as I progressed through the poem. This was an entirely new process for me and really helped to grow as a beatmaker, melody writer, and a vocalist. The song just literally grew with each line of the poem that as I interpreted it and it turned out to be one of the most interesting things I've ever produced.
Wildflowers
I actually wrote this song originally in early 2009 in a songwriting workshop. I was given the word "wildflowers" to write a song about and I knew the person who chose that word was thinking about some hippie-dippie love and nature subject matter so I instead decided to take it to a darker direction. This song is about all the bullshit in life that I can't control that overwhelms and stresses me out and feeling envious of those people that seem to have it all together. It's about just eternally feeling like a hot mess in spite of all efforts not to be. I recorded it on my computer in early 2010. This was the first time since "Don't Be Careful" in 2006 that I experimented with an odd meter.
Third Party
I wrote this song in early January 2010. It is a lyrical experiment. I was really inspired by the 90s music I used to listen to as a teen like Sade and Massive Attack and Gus Gus. It's about wanting to party but not being able to. Feeling like a third wheel and let down by the expectations.