Making the Invisible Visble - The Writing Of Behind My Wall

Making the Invisible "Visible"

The Writing Of Behind My Wall

In response to many requests and enquiries as to how I put songs together or indeed how I write songs I thought I would share the process with you with the writing of a new track "Behind My Wall" from start to finish. This is by no means a definitive way as to the process we write but in this song's case it's the story.

 The Lyrics

So what comes first the words or the music? Well in this case it was a set of lyrics from Adrian that arrived the morning I was due to record another song. For some reason it just hit a nerve and although very little remain of the original draft I could hear the track almost in it's entirety on receipt. I highlighted below the lines in red which got the "chop" on the first draft

Original Lyric:

 sometimes this world can feel so lonely

when theres no one there to see you through

when your locked in doubt

and you cant get out

and your blind to see what you can do

.

and when you reach your darkest hour

and there nowhere left for you to turn

when theres nowhere left to run

the light has faded from your sun

and the fire inside your soul no longer burns

.

let me be the one you run to

be

let me be the one you run to

be the only one you call

I can be your only fortress

let me help you build a wall

doesn't matter how your feeling

when you are low and all alone

i will find a way to reach you

pick you up and bring you home

ill be the one that brings you home

 the only one you call

I can be your only fortress

let me help you build a wall

doesn't matter how your feeling

when you are low and all alone

i will find a way to reach you

pick you up and bring you home

ill be the one that brings you home

.

you can hide away from all that haunts you

i will find you wherever you should roam

if you cry i will hear you

want direction i can steer you

ill always be the one that brings you home

The lyrics that are first recorded took the framework from the above and we added lines "in the moment" or just improvised on the first vocal take. Sometimes you just get rhyming nonsense but occasionally you get something special. The middle 8 section "You Can Fly" was completely improvised both musically and lyrically but for me brought a tension that wasn't there. I think listening back it comes from a Supertramp influence.

Forget your ipads, tablets, mobile phones etc I do find the act of physically writing helps with "meterage" and "weight" and sometimes when you see a line written back it clearly doesn't fit into the song. It's a good discipline for me. 

The Music

I had always wanted to put a straight "pianoman" song together. Even the "Pazz" album which is predominantly piano based keeps the piano as a background instrument rather than a lead. So unapologetically if this sounds like a Billy Joel or an Elton John song well it probably does. Wev'e captured the first take of the piano on my facebook page which gives a framework to the verse and chorus as well as the opening "hook"

Kevin Hall Behind My Wall Piano Take One

Sketch

So combining both the lyrics and music the first thing we do is produce a "sketch" to give an idea of the song. At this stage lyrical and musical accuracy is not the major concern. The sketch will contain many errors as essentially it's about a day's worth of ideas all thrown together with very little taken out. Most of what is on this version is "improvised" and lacks cohesion however you do start to get a flavour of the track and for me living with it in the car on journey's I start to hear the "That doesn't work" or "I Like that" and prepare the track demo version.

For the first sketch we use programmed instruments with maybe live keyboards and guitar. This particular track was completely written from the piano take which is more or less the original take. At this stage the only accuracy we really look for is the speed of the track as ultimately it sets up the "groove" and "feel" and a couple of beats per minute (bpm) can make the difference in the song sounding just clumsy.

Unfortunately I am not blessed with an amazing voice which is why I spend most my time working with other singers but it does have a very large range and it's great just for getting the idea in place and gives everybody a smile along the way. It probably isn't as bad as I'm making out but I do self deprecation very well (good catholic trait!) 

Behind My Wall - Sketch