I was adrift, I know. I had my wounds and oats to sew/sow. You never called my bluff. You took me in when I'd had enough. I'd like to thank you for your love. How many dreams passed by? How many clouds have darkened up the sky? All I could never show. Had 30 years and life to go. I'd like to thank you for your love. I'd like to thank you for your love. I ran so many times. I was scared as well as blind. I couldn't see the things you showed to me. Before that's all she wrote I guess I learned the antidote was you and where I'd always have to be. I was adrift I know. Had 30 years and life to go. I'd like to thank you for your love. I'd like to thank you for your love. I'd like to thank you for your love.
Joe Pernice Bony Gap Music (BMI), admin. by BUG/BMG
The late poet William Corbett was a good friend of mine. He started it out as one of my professors at UMass Amherst while I was in the MFA Program there. He was a visiting professor to the program, and I got lucky that our times at UMass overlapped. I really can’t say in a single post how much I learned from him. And though I pretty much abandoned the work of writing poetry for that of songs, I credit Bill as one of the people who inspired me live the life of an artist. (If he were alive now I might break his balls some and BLAME him for inspiring me to live the life of an artist.) So, for now you’ll just have to trust me that I owe him a lot.
Bill would commute two hours each way once or twice a week from his home in Boston’s South End to Amherst, MA. Because he didn’t hold regular office hours, he encouraged students to send him poems in the mail to be critiqued. Bill was a voracious letter writer. Since I was writing poems at a pretty manic pace, I would write to him three or four times a week. He answered every one. Soon we just started writing to each other, suggesting books, films, music, etc. It was a pretty amazing way to build and carry on a friendship.
Here’s why I mention Bill. Back then, email was pretty young, but it was becoming more and more common. I suggested to Bill we email each other instead of write physical letters. He shot that down pretty fast. He was pretty insightful back then when he said he worried that if letters and evolving drafts of poetry existed only in the digital realm, there was the real risk that they’d be deleted or edited, wiping out all evidence of growth. I remember the conversation because I had recently been in the Smith College Library where they displayed handwritten and typed drafts of some of Sylvia Plath’s poems. Many were written on the backs of found memos and flyers. I recall thinking it was very cool to see the evolution of her poems. Even a true genius does plenty of excavating to find the amulet. (That said, near the end of her life, SP was cranking out a couple finished poems a day. She was like a spun coin, revolving faster and faster as it nears the end of its spinning.)
I have a stack of maybe 150 letters from Bill. They tell half a story.
When I started making music in earnest in the early/mid 1990s, right about at the end of my time in the UMass MFA program, I made demos, but not a crazy amount. I had part-time access to a cassette four track machine, but that was about it. Setting it up was a pain in the ass. And because I’ve never been much of a sound engineer, the demos sounded horrible. I never used a recording device as a writing/editing tool. Recording was the end of the process.
Now things are totally different. Making decent sounding recordings is relatively easy and inexpensive. I began making quick recordings to my phone. (If you’re a paid subscriber here, you know this very well. Most of the recording included here were recorded to my phone.)
I’ll often listen to my recordings while I’m driving somewhere. Long highway drives are great because my mind relaxes and I listen to tracks over and over. I do lots of mental editing and re-writing while driving. Then I’ll go home and make a new recording of the edited version. When the song is close I’ll open the computer and make a demo in logic. In the old days I may a have one or two demo versions of a song. These days I might have 10 to 20 versions. Examining the previous version leads to the next. For me at least there’s value in having a copy of most of the evolving versions of songs. Let me know if there’s any interest, and I may make a post or two where I release multiple versions of a single song…from the earliest, quarter-baked idea to the final version. There are songs of mine that I think are pretty good, and I can assure there are versions along the way that are laughably unrealized.
I wrote the song Thank You for Your Love for a country record I’m making. The song is for my wife Laura, the love of my life. It’s all there. I won’t say much more about it.
Last year I did a house show tour and travelled by car. Before I left I’d written the changes and melody to the song, but no words. On the morning after my Des Moines, IA show I was driving to Chicago. It was a beautifully sunny day. No traffic. I listened to the phone recording of the changes, and the words started flowing. I pulled over and made a voice memo of the lyrics. I knew I’d cracked it. I was—as they say—off to the races.
The version I include today is a multi-tracked demo version I made in Logic. It’s a decent demo version, but the key is one step too low for my voice. The subsequent versions were pitched up into the better key. When the studio version is someday released, maybe you can A/B them and say aloud, “Yes, Joe, you were right to change the key.” But the spirit of the song is there.
I have said nothing about how important it is for me to be able to step back from the moments of inspiration and to look at what I’ve done as objectively as I can and be willing to take a hatchet to my “brilliant work” there on the tape. That’s an entirely different post. But I will say having a crude recording to listen to ex post facto the fever of creation is pretty handy.
As always, thanks for listening. To my paid subscribers, this post is free to everyone, but I will make a bonus post in a couple days that will be exclusive to you, my most appreciated fans.
If you’d care to become a paid subscriber, the fee is $5.00 USD per month. For that you get the whole enchilada if the enchilada is music, text, etc,.
Also, my lates record Who Will You Believe is currently available on vinyl, CD and cassette from New West Records.
You may read a bit about Bill Corbett here. He was a great guy and a true artist.
Take care of yourselves and those around you.
-JP
Thank You for Your Love