Creating Healing Time

Date concieved: 27th April 2022 This was the first song finished for the album, back in 2022. I wasn't trying to finish a song by myself, but I had the idea for it and just kept chipping away at it. In Storm of Crows, what Paul usually did was write a song but make a finished version of it on his own as he wanted to know what it would sound like. Then Jimmy and I would do our own thing, and the song would evolve.

For our album, Twenty-Five Years, we agreed to write four songs each for the album. Not long in, I knew what mine would be and had recorded everything I could for them. We usually ended up waiting for Paul to finish his parts last, because his work schedule made it a bit difficult for him to find the time. While we were waiting, a chord riff came to me.

It was very simple. Me riffing around a D chord, then moving the shape up to the fifth fret and playing the same thing, then going to the seventh, and then the tenth. After I did that a few times, I went back to the D for the verse and then realized the progression to F and G worked really well, and that was about it.

I typically write two or three verses, a chorus, and a guitar solo for a song. However, I really liked how this one was developing, so I thought I could put in a slightly elaborate middle 8 with some very fast vocals. I wrote quite a long passage of text for this, but when I tried to sing it, it sounded like a bad rap, and I realised it didn't sit right. I changed the middle 8 to something slower and realised I could still use some of the lyrics I'd written, distilling it down to what now remains (alas, I didn't keep whatever I cut, but I'm pretty sure it was bad).

I'd also recently bought a suite of plugins and software called Total Studio 3.5 by IK Multimedia for about £100 (usually worth "£12000"!) and part of it was something called Philharmonic, where you can use MIDI to play orchestral instruments. I also have software for converting guitar notes into MIDI, so I played a basic solo and used the MIDI to trigger a flute, a French horn, and an oboe for the solo. I also added some strings and horns for the gentla backing.

The lead guitar was pretty simple for this one, just a few riffs in the bridge between verses, but it needed something else, so I thought about putting on a low harmony. That's the part that took me ages. First, working out what notes I actually needed, and then trying to play it as perfectly in sync as possible. Much later, I decided it'd sound great to have the guitar come back as the chorus was repeating at the end of the song, but a) thought I might struggle to find the exact guitar tone again and b) really couldn't be bothered trying to do it, so I just copied and pasted one of the existing parts and adapted it so it fit nicely.

The bass was a lot of fun. This was my first attempt at REALLY playing the bass. I'd only recently gotten the 5-string, so I was keen to actually use that low B string, and the riff I came up with used it repeatedly to very good effect, I think. Though my happiest moment with the bass was with the chorus. For the first line the notes remain the same, but for the second line they descend. This is inspired by The Invisible Man by Queen, where Roger Taylor's bassline on the chorus does exactly the same thing throughout the song, but on that last chorus, it goes down and down and just lifts the song higher than it already was. I couldn't hold on that long, so just did it on the second half of every chorus instead.

The intent with the song was for Paul and Jimmy to work out their own parts, and it could be a track on the second album (they even got a preview of it a couple of years ago), but it wasn't to be, so I just left it as it was and figured something would get done with it at some point. Well, it finally did.