To Name A Song

I’m going way back to the first song on my second album, a song called Antelope March. I love this song, it was really fun to put together.

I was rehearsing in a rehearsal room in Harold’s Cross, in a room next to a stable where horses were kept. On the drumkit there, I tapped out a simple rhythm which became the foundation of the song. I had a working title of ‘Antelope’ drawn from a lyric:

An antelope walks across the kitchen, silent and noble she knows what I’m thinking.

As I worked on it over a number of months, I changed the working title to Antelope January, Antelope February and then of course Antelope March. I was working with a great producer at the time, Jimmy Eadie, and in his special studio in Bow Lane in Dublin (now sadly a hotel or something similar) I shared Antelope March with him. He commented that it was a strange title. I said nothing and reflected on how it worked well with the atmosphere of the song, suggesting marching Antelopes and fantastical vistas.

I love to stay open to these cosmic whisperings, to surrender control and hear suggestions beyond myself.

Production Questing in 'Breaking'

It was pointed out to me that a few of the production choices employed on ‘Breaking’ were synthetic versions of organic things. The omnichord is a take on the autoharp, and it sounds like it’s breaking apart as it shimmers. In the background of the song there’s a choral sound, I think it was made within a Mellotron plugin I use in Logic Pro. The choir sounds like an approximation of a choir. I think it sounds really lovely against Justin Grounds beautiful strings. The drum machine that underpins the song is like the memory of a drumbeat.. I almost took it out.

The dual vocals are actually a little ragged. I don’t know that this was deliberate but it fit a song called ‘Breaking’.

So there’s a kind of tension between the organic and the synthetic. These are choices you consider in production, you search and then you hope they fit. Sometimes in hindsight you can rationalise why you did something but it didn’t feel like a rational decision when you made it. Sometimes you just want something that sounds like another land.