Comments
Blew away
"written by and produced by the man himself, welcome to james. quiet and cool and whispered. this is a beautiful song.
the only song we have ever done that i did not stick my nose into and i am glad i didn't.
not to be confused with blue. and if you love her..." by billy Corgan.
The Boy
This is a New Wave song that has the power-pop Jazzmaster with a warped neck that looks cool but isn't really good to play.
There's also this funny guitar-drum break in the middle of the song where I hang a chord and use the whammy bar.
Flood liked this song but it just didn't fit the album.
...said sadly
A fun song to write and record.
It's sort of my version of a country duet song.
I recorded this the day after we finished the music for the album, and had a friend of mine, Nina Gordan (of Veruca Salt), sing with me because she's got a great tone and character in her voice.
The guitar fills and slide guitar are in the style of Derek & the Dominoes, Clarence White, the Byrds and the Allman Brothers.
We did one track of guitar fills with a Les Paul through an MXR phaser with a clean sound, as well as another track of Les Paul slide guitar which gives the song kind of a romantic sound, most of which was done in one or two takes.
A Night Like This
This is one of my favorite Cure songs, but in doing a cover we always tried to change something about it.
I decided to make it a slow, acoustic dirge with different drum feels for each part instead of a straight beat through the whole song.
There's also a cello, which gives it a gothic feel.
At the end it sorta rocks out with some Big Muff and Neil Young & Crazy Horse kind of rhythm guitars.
The Bells
Here is what James said about The Bells.
I wrote "The Bells" two or three years ago, and each instrument was seemingly recorded about six or seven months apart-not really on purpose, but just as a demo that kept growing.
I recorded the acoustic guitars at my old apartment, and then after I moved, I recorded Eric Remschneider's cello part in my basement.
Then, for this single, I had another friend, Adam Schlesinger (of Fountains of Wayne and Ivy), play piano, and then D'Arcy and I did the vocals.
I like the song because it is very simple but has a twist in the time signatures-sort of in the Nick Drake style.
Believe
This was another song recorded the day after the music for the album was done.
It's supposed to be an uplifting song, but it had this undercurrent of longing, depression, sadness, etc....The opening guitar was played on a Gibson J-100XTRA, which has got this great, wide-open sound, and there's a clean electric guitar doubling it but mixed way back to give a chorusing "sparkle."
There are also two bass guitar tracks on most of the song, played on a weird Epiphone bass that I bought for a hundred dollars at a pawn shop, and which also got used a lot on Siamese Dream.
On the track, one plats chords high up and the other just plays the root notes to give it some weight.
Solo AlbumuLet It Come Downv
Be Strong Now
I wrote this song about a girl who had very low self-esteem and couldn't seem to express herself.
I imagined what she could trust, like a best friend or a lover.
Sound Of Love
The central idea of this song, musically and lyrically, came to me spontaneously with the guitar introduction and the first line, "The sound of love Is oceans far away".
It all came after that and became this song about desire and a longing for something missing.
Beauty
I worked on this song for months - it seemed impossible to piece together what sounded like three different songs.
I played it on the acoustic guitar for Matt and Adam and they both flipped for it and convinced me to finish what turned out to be this epic, euphoric song.
See The Sun
wrote most of this album on the acoustic guitar but I didn't want it to be an "unplugged" record.
I like the idea of this good, electric band drenched with acoustic guitars playing to the song and the singer.
I tried to make simple musical arrangements which hopefully have a more timeless quality.
This song, I think is a good example, and I like it because it's in my natural low singing voice and the track really builds and sort of breathes.
Country Girl
This is one of the first songs where I started experimenting with alternate tunings, which gives it this wide-open sound.
It's a nostalgic, naive love song with these real intimate vocals and lyrics.
Jealousy
One day during mixing we put up the tape and found all these first-take guitar parts that Greg and I had played.
In the Intro of the song, when they're all played together, they give it this loose, jammy sort of feel, which makes it more electric and uplifting, a happy accident.
One And Two
A song I've had since the last Pumpkins record.
It has this real fragile sound and it feels like if the catch were undone, all the elements of the song would be thrown in different directions.
I wanted that feel so it would read like a letter or have the sound of someone whispering in yourear.
Lover,Lover
A romantic paean to a relationship I had where I felt we were the only two people in the world who understood each other - it's an "us against the world""sort of song.
The backing track has this Neil Young Harvest -era feel to it, which I like - real simple, acoustic guitar, straight drums.
We added strings and Neil's harmony.
Silver String
Another song I wrote in an open tuning, and it has a lot of nice chord voicings.
Lyrically, it's an open declaration of love for someone that I felt so good about and had to tell.
I really love ballads, - I even like "Four Seasons of Change" by Boyz 2 Men.
I tried to write a traditional rock ballad, but with a country feel.
Adam played a great piano track, and the strings are kind of Phil Spector-ish. There's some Keith Richards-style country noodling dropped in to keep it from being a completely straight ballad.
Winter
An old song.
We took the song from an eight-track cassette demo of mine and dumped it onto a 24 track tape and started building on that.
The song has two parts, the first of which Is this floaty, atmospheric section and as it builds it changes Into this soaring, acoustic gospel song.
No One's Gonna Hart You
I though this song would be a good way to finish.
I write a lot of relationship songs, and musically this one has everything - pedal steel strings, harmonies.
Lyrically, It encapsulates the themes of this record about love and faith.