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Right
Now
MO: The most fun I've ever had with a song about nothing. Or
about Grade 9 social studies class, and cool rhymes. Or something. Hey,
why did nobody complain when I stopped playing harmonica on this one?
JT: Speaking of Grade 9, my mandolin solo is stolen straight
from a trombone solo in "Dr. Blues", a junior high band chart!
AG: Kind of a minimalist track on my part; not much to say except
that I didn't even notice when the harmonica disappeared.
ML: It took me a long time to settle on a part for this song
(until well after we recorded it) because it already sounded so good
without the tin whistle when I came into the band. And switching to
flute during the bridge was fun for the cd, but, as I found out later,
tends to be just a wee bit tricky to do live!
Laisse Faire
MO: Ah yes...three years of teen angst compressed into a 4-minute
pop anthem! (We're still friends, by the way.) Aaron's cymbal pattern
in the chorus is still the coolest, too. He's also the one who got me
to do the last chorus in French.
AG: I liked this song because there were so many sections but
each one flowed into the other really well. There was a neat studio
effect in this song that was unintentional. Between the mandolin and
guitar strings and the hi-hat, the chorus section, despite being kind
of syncopated, ended up having a really strong pulse that sounded like
a shaker. Rest assurred, however, that there were no percussion overdubs
in this one.
ML: One of our first songs to really click for me when I was
first learning our rep. Still one of my favourites, especially that
abrupt ending.
Ground
MO: Ground was hard to record (no clicktrack!), but fun...the
beginning turned out all cowboy-ish, which is neat. This song is set
in springtime Edmonton, so it's kinda dry and brown.
JT: Only after recording this track did I finally master mandolin
tremolo technique...oh well.
AG: I'm still amazed we pulled this off; there are 6 different tempos
in this song and no click track, yet it doesn't sound sloppy at all.
ML: Still kind of reminds me of 'Rawhide' at the beginning...
Bird
MO: This was the first time ever in Cove that we'd done a song
not written by me...lately Aaron's been writing up a storm though, so
look for a lot more killer Gervais tunes on Album #2!
JT: I don't play on this track.
AG: It's kind of neat that the first song I ever wrote for the band
turned out good enough for the album. I have since written a lot of
material that has been rejected by myself and the band, as well as some
more good stuff that will hopefully be on the next album, however Bird
will always be special as the first; the one that kicked started me
into writing for Cove. Now, I kind of have a mini-goal of at least matching
Matt song-for-song on the next album, if not contributing more songs.
(hee hee hee!)
ML: Had so much fun doing a nice laid-back solo all based around
one idea. Still love that "do you get along with plants, or does the
grass just stain your pants" line!
Fuga
MO: There is nothing more joyously ego-boosting than the "chorus
of me" that comes in on the bridge. I owe Ian big for making my
dream of sounding like the Barenaked Ladies come true! This is still
one of my favourite tracks. The song's name comes from the "fugues
of amnesia" line (inspired by a close reading of Flowers for Algernon)
and Jeremy's brilliant idea of stealing an intro from Bach.
JT: Half of the time I spent in the studio on this record was
to record the "fuga" intro, sort of a bastardization of the
second movement of the Bach G minor Partita. All I will say is that
it is a hell of a lot easier to play on violin!
AG: Another minimalist one on my part; just keeping time, basically.
Ian, our producer, remarked after mixing some of the songs that are
like this that I only hit the toms once or twice in a song. That was
true then and still is; I feel some of those songs are just better when
I do the very least that I have to.
ML: Anybody else noticing that it seems like Jeremy's been doing
a lot of 'borrowing'?
Jig!
MO: This was our first-ever "celtic" number, and we
owe it all to Mat. Jeremy, Bryan and I had a lot of fun doing the "Jig"
yells three times over, too, even if Ian thought we sounded too serious.
AG: In a way this song has been kind of our saviour and our plague.
It's a good tune and was one reason we got the house gig at O'Byrne's
Irish Pub in Edmonton that we enjoy so much, but it's also been responsible
for taking Cove in directions we didn't really intend to, and that has
gotten us in a bit of trouble. We all like Celtic music, but it seems
to want to take more of a leading role in our music than we feel comfortable
with, being primarily a folk-rock band. If we were all Irish, I think
it would be a different story, but I don't feel we can give it complete
justice, so we try to shy away from doing more than adding some "Celtic
Flavours" to our sound.
ML: I remember the rehearsal where we all got so gung-ho on doing
this little jig from one of my Irish tin whistle books. A fun song when
we weren't going so fast that my tongue was going numb!
Going
MO: Co-wrote the words to this one with Jeremy after someone
told us that all of our songs were "sad". So we sat down and
made a list (both serious and tongue-in-cheek) of everything we liked,
so that we could make a "happy" song. Well, we got a song
out of it, but instead we just sound kinda selfish...
JT: You have no idea what kind of trouble the "cashmere
sweater" line has gotten me into! I play viola on this one, which
is something I no longer do (ever since I got my electric violin) but
I really like the darker sound.
AG: I always enjoyed this one, especially how my bass drum and
Bryan's bass line synced up so perfectly in the chorus. The greed factor
in the lyrics kind of reminds me of a comic strip I saw somewhere recently:
Two glum-looking teenagers are sitting in a tree fort, staring into
space. One of them says, "How are we ever supposed to become decent
songwriters if our parents keep fulfilling all our needs?"
ML: HeeHee! Wasn't me who got in trouble! But it was funny to
watch!
Races' End
MO: This one, unexpectedly, turned out wonderfully! Best drum
sound on the whole album (imho), and Aaron's percussion and Jeremy's
impromptu violin part helped make my crazy idea for a piano-song (first
recorded drunkenly in my basement as a demo) into something else entirely.
This is also the only song on Later to contain veiled Canadian/Albertan
political commentary alongside the usual stuff about girls...okay, not
much, but it's there! The postcard did arrive, too.
JT: This is probably my favourite track on the album. I think
that Matt wrote this song just for my violin part...it just works so
well!
AG: Maybe Matt was drunk, but I wasn't.
Slow on the
Curve
MO: This one has really been rocking lately live, so it's back
in our repertoire...Cove's first attempt at "alternative rok"
(sort of), and my personal paean to broken-down relationships and rhyme
schemes.
JT: I really didn't like this song when we recorded it, but I
have since revamped my part. (That's why it has sounded so good lately,
I'm sure!)
AG: This one was always alot of fun for me.
ML: Took me a long time to find a part for this one that I liked
too. At the time of the recording I was experimenting with overblowing
and harmonics to try and get a rough-around-the-edges, Pan flute-ish
sound. Didn't work so well in the studio and I had to do a bit of improvising.
I finally began to like the song about a year later with a newly re-vamped
part. Matt's right though: it rocks pretty well now.
Puppeteer
MO: A little nod to our front-porch folk jam roots...still have
a big soft spot for this one. Inspired by the end of high school, and
recorded live off the floor (with vocals and whistle added later).
JT: I love the contrast between Slow on the Curve and this one.
It's like a lemon gelato after beef jerky from the Krakus Polish Deli
(right down the street from the studio!).
AG: My favourite track by far, despite the fact that I don't
play on it. I really liked how Matt's vocals came off so perfectly.
It's just a studio gem, this one.
ML: Probably one of my favourite songs we ever did! I really
liked how simple and folkish it turned out to be. Ended up basically
writing my part in the studio (not that it was that complicated!). Good
one for busking.
Tell Me Later
MO: Tell Me Later still closes many a set. I'll never forget
when we added drums to it for the first time, I nearly freaked out.
JT: This song was inspired by e-mail and the weirdness that instant
communication brings. My girlfriend at the time of the recording still
insists on calling it "the internet song".
AG: I had alot of fun adding percussion to this one, from my
sister's East Indian dancing bells to clicking car keys and rubbing
my feet on the carpet of the studio.
ML: That imitation effect between the flute and the violin at
the end is killer when it actually works!
Serendipity
MO: I can't believe how perfect we got my crappy old Fender Avalon
guitar to sound on this one. Another song about the end of school and
the strangeness of time. It took Jeremy, Aaron and Ian almost half an
hour to convince me that keeping Mat's little flute thing at the end
of his solo on the album was a good idea...and I'm so glad they did!
This almost was going to be the title track but was edged out by (Tell
Me) Later.
JT: I remember playing this disc for Joel (our old bassist) and
trying to convince him that it actually was Matt playing the guitar.
AG: This was a fun song to do; it'd be nice if it worked live so
we could play it more often.
ML: Another one of my favourites. I remember Matt and Aaron and
I first jamming on it, and it was so nice and relaxed. When we were
recording Ian had been giving me sort of 'test takes' before every real
one just to get used to the microphone, and that's what I thought this
was. So I goofed around a bit on my solo once I was feeling comfortable.
When I looked up I was getting a lot of weird stares (especially from
Matt - HaHa!). Guess it was being recorded after all. Oops...
ML's nonsense about a "secret track": CSIS and the
FBI still deny this exists. I know what I heard dammit! Don't call me
crazy!
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