Let me fill you in on the past year, creatively speaking…

Remember Our Creative Community? And my own personal goal to post 12 recorded masterpieces (humour me…) this year?

No?  Well, seems I didn’t either.

Actually, I did…I was just ignoring it…

It all went so smoothly for about 5 minutes.  Then I decided to go and produce our church’s first worship album, and it all went a little haywire.  Great excuse huh!

The last song I posted here was back in May.  MAY?!?  Where did the last 6 months go?  Wait, I know exactly where they went.  Lots and lots and LOTS of hours in a recording studio with the awesome worship team from Awesome Church.  It’s a sacrifice I’ve been glad to make, though Diane and I have definitely felt the strain too.  The album is very nearly done though, and this is a good good good thing.

Anyway…

About a month ago, I did a post over at my good friend Jenni Clayville’s blog telling a bit of my story, because like everyone  … I have one. Or two. Maybe more.

In the comments, Jenni’s amazing husband Brian requested a song for his birthday.  Now, he may have been joking (I really don’t know – I never asked – it’s not like I haven’t embarked on this personalised song thing before), but it was the impetus I needed to write something of my own again and see if I could remember how to do this.  I’ve been writing and recording congregational music all year, which involves a very very different process to how I approach my non-church music, which mainly comprises mini electronic pop epics (poptronica).

So I wrote this. You now have your own song, Brian.

And Jenni, I still want to re-do yours properly as a thank-you for sending me the audio file of Brian’s snoring that inspired this.  I’m just looking for a big band… who’ll work for free…

Gotta say though…my snoring is WAY worse than Brian’s. Though the only time it’s been recorded I had sinus and a completely blocked nose, so…

Back to the song…

Lyrics: as usual for me, it took a long time to get the lyrics to happen. Music = easy peasy, but lyrics…no. Except when I’m writing church music, when the lyrics often come first and suggest the melody, etc.  In this case, as for all my commissioned “song-for-a-friend” works, I try to dig up plenty of dirt from significant others, but usually most of the good stuff comes from Twitter and Facebook stalking anyway.  Add in some inspiration from a great post on Brian’s blog, and we have a song that combines Biblical truth, snoring,  fishing for sharks, gas and twittering…amongst other things.

Music: again, as usual for me, it’s crammed too full of ideas because that’s pretty much how I roll all the time; always lots going on.  I love the production side of making music, even though this isn’t produced as well as I’d like it to be, purely due to time constraints.  It also has a few of my now trademark twists, which are therefore not twists because it would be a twist to do something straight.  I may be the M.Night Shyamalan of poptronica.

Love Endures (Snoring) by dg4G

Waking everybody with a sound
That’s been likened to sawing
Some call it snoring
All the best husbands do it
So our wives have something to tweet about

As if the bobbleheaded conversation
sprinkled with some speculation
covering the sanitation habits of the generation
that we’re raising all across the nation
…wasn’t enough

(some choral wailing)

Kids are upside down in nearly
Every single family picture
It’s probably better that way
Definitely better than attempts
to fish for sharks from the car

I wonder whose genes he got?
Should this be rhymed with bergamot?
Maybe, but probably not
Though citrus-scented gas
Might be a winner

(some more choral wailing)

(Love)
Love never gives up, never looks back
Never gives up, never looks back, never gives up…
(endures)

(Love endures)…

Waking everybody with a sound
That’s been likened to sawing
Often called snoring
And if I’m not sleeping through life, you’re not going to either.

**Could I have possibly written a more tongue twisting bridge? Why yes, I could have. This abridged tongue twister (ha!) was the compromised version… It was also much harder to sing at 12.30am than it is now at 10.00am. Hmmmm…  Did you hear the stumbles in there?  I might as well have sung “dup nebber dip dup”…