I Went

"I Went" was recorded live with my band "Ninth", with Bjørn Tore Kronen Taranger on drums. 

The recording is totally raw, and no edits or "studio magic" has been used.
Most of the sound comes from the drum microphones picking up the guitar.
The instrumentation is simple:
Drums, guitar and Rhodes. But, there is an overdubbed acoustic and electric guitar playing through the arrangement along with the original.

The first draft I made for this song was an industrial electronic upbeat arrangement in the key of E major.
This version (F minor, free time) is probably more inspired by my Motown/Stax upbringing. I grew up with all that stuff (in the house, not in the times though;)  and I wanted to keep "production values"  back in the 60's for this song. 

I think people underestimate R&B from the old times.
I can't stand the 80's slap stuff, or the pop/fusion funk stuff. I can't say that I'm particularly fond of modern R&B (pop) either, I find it way too "homogenized". 

But I just love the attitude, creativeness and feel from those early records and use it shamelessly wherever I want, on my tracks.

It was a time when R&B, Funk and Soul music was three sides of the same story. 

On the session with me:
Bjørn Tore Kronen Taranger: Drums  

Assassin

This song was recorded live, with the band Ninth. 
Part of the instrumentation was composed along with the song "Godsped", and in the beginning, they actually were the same song. But that's a long time ago, and I was barely a teenager. 

As usual, the song evolved over time, and went through several bands and lineups. 

The sound of "Assassin" is based around the fact that it was recorded live, but I try to break my rules as much as I can, from song to song. For example, I love the sound of an indie band just as much as an american rock production. Not that it's anything special about that.

There's obviously a reason why Motown funk sounds different than a punk record (other than the musicians, the agenda and the expression of the song), sonically there is physics behind it too, something that audio engineers and producers use to their advantage. Sound waves has their own good and bad sides that varies with tempo, volume, expression and so on. In music production, this is a language by itself, that is used to communicate to a group of people, with certain values. Or in other words: an audience, or in other words: a market. 

But I can't control myself when it comes to these things, give the funk drums a punk sound, and add lots of real reverberation. Give the hard rock guitar a synth/clean sound. Chop up the drums in the middle and add some crazy analog filters. Give the bass guitar some distortion and lots of treble. Add to that the slow and mellow vocals, to what was once a live recording. 

Personally, I see music genres as dead. All of them! When it becomes defined as a genre it's  already captured and become a part of the museum. That doesn't mean that I don't love the music. It's just not something that I would pursue artistically.

But there's one great thing that all these genres have in common, something I do want to keep alive: The people behind them never gave a shit about how things should be done. 

Drums: Bjørn Tore Kronen Taranger, Geir Satre

River

River was composed in 2006/2007

There are many recordings of this song. This particular recording was done live, in the studio with Bjørn Tore Taranger on drums, and was originally, only meant for pre production.

But I like the character of live recordings. Especially in the early stages, when a song is so fresh that the musicians don’t really know it by memory, the attention to detail is in a different place, and the spontaneity comes out in a different way. 

One of the great things about this project is that; I have great freedom to present songs in different settings and arrangements, and it is a vital part of this 5 year long album.

Sometimes I’ll choose an organic, simple live recording, where most of the arrangement is improvised, followed by a song with a dense orchestrated arrangement that took years to produce. Since most of the material has been worked on for years, I can now choose what I want. I am not restrained to songs only, but also which expression, setting, timbre I want to present. 

Even though I always approach composition as an innovator, I’ve always found the process of making all these different approaches seamless, very interesting and meaningful.  Simple against complex, authentic against surreal. The same goes for composition: dark against light, mellow against energetic and so on. I apply this on everything, from a 5 second intro, to the 5 year album that this will become. 

In that spirit, I can say that «River» was arranged to take over for «Needle Take Me Home» The songs are hugely diffeent, from melody structure, to arrangement (and recording philosophy), but the ending of «Needle» was made so that «River» could come after. And this is the first time this have been acheived. «River» with it’s rough, and swinging backing, against «Needle»’s "asymmetrical meets architectural" lines.  

It was important that «River» didn’t become a "pop song" so ironically, I spent more time finding a recording with the right atmosphere, than it would take to record it over, ten times. 

WIth me on the session:

Bjørn Tore Kronen Taranger: Drums

Needle Take Me Home

Dude, where is your sting?

"Needle Take Me Home" was composed in 2006, arranged in 2007 and recorded in 2009.

On the surface, it is about drug abuse, but it's also about coping with the pressure and demands we put on ourselves (or others put on us).

The title came up as a twist to the biblical quote "death where is your sting" 

I made four different versions of the song with (slightly) different lyrics, melody variations and intensity. Some of these versions will be released in the "Needle Take Me Home" package, at a later stage. 

The idea behind the arrangement was to make it more surreal as it evolves, and change the "gravity point" of the fundamental chord progression and beat. A bit like not knowing what's up or down, or real anymore. 
A metaphor for hallucinations or dreams,  half pleasant, half nightmare, madness maybe, or a drug high.

"Tomorrow's a another day", is a great saying, but an excuse for many things. Probably the worst excuse invented. What do you think?

I wrote most of the lyrics over some nice, sunny summer days in Norway (which is rare). It was one of those songs that I started thinking about whenever I was outside relaxing (and probably a bit bored). Fittingly, I am  now writing this blog on one of the first sunny days this summer! (after months of rain). So I guess  "tomorrow's another day" came true for me today.  Hope it does for you too! 

With me on the session:
Bjørn Tore Kronen Taranger: Acoustic drums

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It's not always easier to be a rich celebrity..

In My Town

"In My Town" was composed in early spring, 2002.

It starts out as a love song, and develops into a tale about death impersonated; lamenting for all living in pain and suffering. I’ll say no more! (probably shouldn’t have said anything at all :)

It is, however a "good tempered" song, and not meant to be sad in any way (go figure!, I'll probably delete this post all together.)

It was inspired by north-asian traditional music (from Russia, Estonia and surrounding countries) which I love! It's in some ways similar to nordic music, and we love our glimmering darkness from time to time (ok I'll speak for myself).

Some of the music from this territory has a kind of naive innosence to it on the surface, but underneath there is a dark and almost crystalized melancholy. 

You'll find it in folk songs everywhere, but it is handled so uniqely in the Russian music, in my opinion. 

It was only inspired by it,  Im not claiming that "In My Town" is a full fledged Russian orthodox chant, but what's on the radar for this 5 year long album might surprise you! (at least I hope it will). 

On the recording with me:

Geir Arne Ose: Drums

Bjørn Tore Tarranger: Drums