Final version of Loving on the Road

I finally finished the song 'Loving on the Road' and here is the final version of the lyrics.



When I first went on the road
It was exciting it was fun
Loneliness not invited in
We were quite the rowdy ones
On the road I saw many towns
But it’s not new, the thrill is gone

Don't hate me, don't hate me
I was always true
But when it comes to loving on the road
I will still want you

Never saw a pretty face
To match you, could not match you
Your voice lingers on my mind
You're with me, you’re still with me
I don't know how I could go on
You were always the strong one

I slip back to my hotel room
Look out the window, pretend to see you
I don’t notice the night has gone by
I don’t notice it’s dawn...
It’s dawn

It’s dawn and I’m on the road again
Another day another town
It clings to me with many miles
It pulls me down, I will not go down
Soon I will be heading home
I am such the lucky one

Please love me, please love me
I was always true
When it comes to loving on the road
I will still want you


This version just has some lyrics tweaks from the last version I discussed. The first one is with the lines


I don't know how I could go on
You were always the strong one

Which was previously

I don't know how I could go on
Without you, I need you

The original intention of those two lines was to repeat the pattern set by the other line pairs in the verse. In the other line pairs in that verse, the second line repeats a phrase ( To match you, could not match you - You're with me, you’re still with me). That might have worked better if I could continue that through the song but I wanted a common tie throughout the entire song not just that verse so I changed that line. The replacement line although not lyrically similar to lines in the first and third verse, has a similar cadence to those lines. Here are the three lines that are tied together

We were quite the rowdy ones
You were always the strong one
I am such the lucky one

It might not seem like these lines have anything in common but when you listen to the song you will (hopefully) hear the similarity.

The second change was because of an oops moment in the previous lyrics for the third verse. Those were

It's dawn and I am off again
Another day, another town
Soon I will be heading home
I am such the lucky one

As you can see, this verse only has two line pairs and the others has three. So I needed to write two more lines for this verse. I had this thought of the wariness of being on the road sticking to the person in the song. That eventually became the lines

It clings to me with many miles
It pulls me down, I will not go down

The only problem is that this line made no sense within the rest of the lyrics of the third verse. The thing that is clinging is the road but that is not in any of the other lyrics. So I changed the first line from 'It's dawn and I am off again' to 'It’s dawn and I’m on the road again' and then it made sense.

Here is the recording of the final version of the song

Loving on the Road by rdlipps

Enjoy,

-ron-

Test

Test of embedded MP3 player


Loving on the Road

New Song - Real Enough

Here is a new song called "Real Enough". The chord progression for this song has been something I have been playing around with for several years and from time to time it comes up when I'm just noodling around on the guitar. Actually it is the chord change from E to Bm that I have been trying to work into a song. Well I finally got something to work and I have the beginning of a song. I'm trying something different and instead of just giving you clips, I've recorded a bit that shows the progression. This goes through my last attempt a few month ago to what I have today. As always forgive the bad singing of the melody. Here is that recording



Real Enough - Song Progression by tazthecat

I have a few preliminary lyrics that are (this is very early in writing the song so these are rough):

Well I didn't know that you were here
Cause I didn't stare
Feel that my thoughts are real enough

I see it in your smile
I feel it in my heart

You say you want to dance
I say I don't know how
The pain as I step on your feet is real enough

I was trying to come up with lyrics and the phrase 'Real Enough' popped into my head so I started writing lyrics around that. Sometimes the lyrics come from an idea, sometimes I come up with one or more verses, and sometimes I come up with the chorus first. This is the first time I've been able to write a song starting with just a phrase.

The chord progression I finally ended up with is E - Bm - Am - F - G - C. This started out as being E - Bm - Am - G - F - Am but this chord progression descended down the scale from the Bm and I wanted to break up that progression to make the song more interesting (that and I'm working on another song that has a similar descending chord progression). The last thing that I needed was a transition from the C chord back to the starting chord in the verse, which is the E chord. What I came up with is the riff that started on the c note on the fifth string of the guitar and descended down the scale. The notes in the riff are c-b-a-g-e. This was good but I needed something better so I ended the riff on an E chord instead of just the e note and to make it more interesting the second time through, I end the riff on a G chord. That is what you hear in the recording.

That's it for now. As I make progress on this song I will post updates.

Enjoy,

-ron-

Loving on the road - Update

Here is an update to the lyrics of "Loving on the Road", previously known as Untitled Song 1. I went with the second option for the bridge (discussed in a previous post) and have lyrics for the bridge as well as a first cut of the lyrics for the final verse. Here are the lyrics so far

When I first went out on the road
It was exciting it was fun
Loneliness was not invited in
We were quite the rowdy ones
Out on the road I saw many towns
But it's not new, the thrill is gone

Chorus
Don't hate me, don't hate me
I was always true
But when it comes to loving on the road
I will still want you

Never saw a pretty face
To match you, they could not match you
Your voice lingers on my mind
You're with me, you're still with me
I don't know how I could go on
Without you, I need you

Bridge
I slip back to my hotel room
Look out the window pretend I see you
I don't notice the night has gone by
I don't notice it's dawn
It's dawn

It's dawn and I am off again
Another day, another town
Soon I will be heading home
I am such the lucky one

Please love me, please love me
I was always true
When it comes to lovin on the road
I will still want you

I will still want you

The transition from the bridge back to the chorus does something that is sometimes done in a song to help make it stick in the listener's mind and that is repeating a line or phrase. I have to thank Larry Rice (my voice/songwriting coach) for this one. If you look at the end of the bridge the lyrics are

I don't notice it's dawn
It's dawn

It's dawn and I am off again

The last phrase of the bridge (it's dawn) is repeated after the bridge and then carried into the first line of the verse. I think it works well. Also at Larry's suggestion, I changed the final chorus by changing "don't hate me" with "please love me". That is why it is always good to have another person to listen to your songs and get different ideas and perspectives.

Well, I now have a first cut at the complete song and a good first cut at the melody. The next update will probably just be tweaks to the lyrics and melody. I still need to record the song, in it's current state , so you can get an idea of how it sounds and I will do that and update this post as soon as I get this done.

Update: here is a recording of the song as it is now.

Loving on the Road - Second Version by tazthecat

As always, enjoy

-Ron-

New Song Number 1 - Update

Well, I've been working on the new song number 1, which is tentatively titles "Loving on the Road". I have written the lyrics for two verses and made a slight change to lyrics in the chorus. This is a song that is not based on personal experience but one of the songs where I get into a character. This will be another of what I'm now calling my "Traveling Musician" series. I'm writing this as a musician that is touring and lamenting being away from the one he loves and the obvious problems this causes. Here is what I have so far in terms of the lyrics.

When I first went out on the road
It was exciting it was fun
Loneliness was not invited in
We were quite the rowdy ones
Out on the road I saw many towns
But it's not new, the thrill is gone

Don't hate me, don't hate me
I was always true
But when it comes to loving on the road
I will still want you

Never saw a pretty face
To match you, they could not match you
Your voice lingers on my mind
You're with me, you're still with me
I don't know how I could go on
Without you, I need you


As you recall from my last post, I had two versions of the bridge and right now I am towards the second version (the one with the Am - F - E - A chord progression). I am working on the melody for that version and getting a better chord progression that will transition back to the verse. I think I like this version because the Am & F chords are in one key and the E & A chords are in another but I like weird chord changes :)

Anyway, I will keep everyone up to date as the song progresses and will try to get a song clip recorded so you can hear the progress so far.

Enjoy,

-ron-

Three days of inspiration and humility

This past extended weekend I was at Floydfest, which is a music festival in southern Virginia near the town of Floyd. It featured diverse styles of music; bluegrass, folk, jazz, latin, African, rock, and blues. Although it was hot, it was a truly fun and remarkable experience and I heard so much incredible music and watched so many incredible musicians. If you have a chance, you should go to this festival.

I have no illusions that I'm a good musician, I'm decent and I enjoy playing but I'm a pale comparison to the professionals out there. Listening and watching the musical talent at Floydfest, however, brought a whole new level of humility to this musician. There was so much talent there even in the smaller, less known acts. Two bands in particular served me a big slice of humble pie. The first was a band called The Wave. This band was made-up of four young musicians that played like they had been together for decades. So much talent. The second was Lefty Williams, which is a blues band that is fronted by a guitarist that was born with only half of his right arm (hence his nickname). Despite his handicap, his guitar playing was amazing and easily better than most of the other guitar players at Floydfest. All I could say was WOW.

Here are links to Floydfest and the bands I discussed

Floydfest
The Wave
Lefty Williams Band

Well, I'm back home and back on the grid so I will be catching up on my posts. I also have several new songs that I am working on so you will here about them as I decide which old song I want to cover next.

Enjoy,

-ron-

Butterfly Bush Part 2

In my last post about the song "Butterfly Bush", I had discussed the initial draft of the song. It was OK but needed some work. The first thing that needed improvement was the melody of the verse. Initially the melody was the same for each line and that made the song sound dull and boring. This is how the verse sounded originally

Butterfly Bush - Original Melody by tazthecat

Here is the final version of the song (you will need to refer back to this audio for changes I discuss later in this post)

Butterfly Bush by rdlipps

What I did was sing lower on the first line of the verse and the melody followed the chord progression and the second line I sung higher and the melody starts with a couple 3rd intervals and then a descending scale back down to the root (A). This pattern repeats once more in the verse. The melody change on the second line of the verse clashed with the original chord progression so I changed the rhythm so I would get back to the Am chord sooner. I also stay on the Am chord longer than in the original (mainly to allow a chance for a breath before going to the next line). This is what you here in the final version.

I don't remember making any significant changes to the chorus. Maybe some tweaks to make sure the notes in the melody were the chords that were being played.

The first part of the bridge is close to the original with maybe some clean-up of the melody. During the D and C9 chords the melody uses an interval from d to a (decending fourth) for the D chord and an interval from d to g (descending fifth) for the C9. The C9 chord is used because the d note is the 9th (2nd) note in the C scale. OK it was actually the other way around: the C9 chord was in the chord progressing and it allowed be to use those intervals in the melody but I liked the sound of it. I'm not sure if that was the original melody or if I worked it out later but that was the only potential change in the first part of the bridge.

Here is what the original bridge sounded like.

Butterfly Bush - Original Bridge by tazthecat

the line that starts out with "Filled with so many..." was meant to be a transition back to the verse but when I was playing it to my voice/songwriting coach, he suggested a change in the melody to what was closer to the final version of the song. I liked the change so much that I rewrote that part of the bridge and made it a whole separate part of the bridge instead of just a transition. This gave the second part of the bridge a somewhat dreamy feel allows for a better transition back to the verse.

The last thing the song needed was the last verse and I used a trick that is sometimes used and that was to modify the first verse and use it as the last. If I put on my songwriting theory hat, I will tell you that this ties the end of the song to the beginning and provides the song a repetition in theme that make the song desirable. Actually I had trouble coming up with lyrics for the last verse so I just used the first verse and changed a line. So whether you like the intellectual or the lazy explanation, that's how I finished the song.

If I think of anything else that is interesting in writing "Butterfly Bush", I will post that later but for now that is it for this song. I hope this discussion was enlightening or at least not completely boring.

Thanks,

-ron-