A manic fever dream of a song about the true engine of the internet that will make you dance like a 22 year old white girl high on molly at EDC and make all the dark thoughts go away. Until the end.
This song originated during the 30 Second Songs project back in 2019.
And it was met with a lot of “Dude, I can’t get that song out of my head!” Which is a signal to me that says “Well, let’s make it longer and more obnoxious then!”
While working on the new version I had to come to terms with what the song is actually about. Comedy requires subtext after all. Otherwise this is just a stupid song with a stupid chorus. And don’t get me wrong. It’s definitely that.
But in thinking about it I was pondering the “head in the sand” nature of the internet. On a daily basis our senses are assailed by news of school shootings, war, and people(?) trying to strip away civil rights. But at the same time we’re looking at “Oh, what a cute baby animal!” “Did you see what she word at Cannes?” And the ever present old standby: Boobs and Butts.
Certainly we can’t live in either of those worlds constantly. Some people do. But at the end of the day the internet just becomes a giant hamster water bottle that we all lap at for a hit of brain chemicals, whether that’s oxytocin and endorphins or adrenaline and cortisol.
And so this song is the manic swing towards the happy and innocent. (Yes, boobs are innocent.) It’s the musical manifestation of this.
Sure the world is falling apart around us and we have to stay ever vigilant to try and improve it. But once in awhile we just need to push back the dark thoughts and look at some kitties and boobs and puppies and butts.
It’s not advice, it’s not a plan. It just is…fine.
My friend asked me to write a song for her baby shower… Her mistake.
Usually song will move in and out of my shows when new stuff gets created. But ever since I released Dodged A Bullet in 2012 it’s been a regular part of the set list. Even the toughest audience will crack and laugh with me on this one.
Is it my Freebird? Could be.
After listening to the original recording I thought it deserved an improved version. So this version is resung, remixed, and remastered.
Yeah, it’s a sappy love song. But it’s my favorite song I’ve ever written. Why?
This one is pretty outside my normal work. But it’s an important one to me. It’s dedicated to lady who’s been by my side for nearly three decades and never once taken the opportunity to give me the boot when she had it. Instead she’s always been there to help and support.
And I hope when you listen to it you’ll think about that person in your life – romantic partner, best friend, awesome family member. Whoever it is that always has your back and shows you you’re not alone in life.
You may have heard Kissing In The Rain after it’s original release in 2015. This is a brand new master, remixed and remastered by Federico Telasco.
Last year I was on a long drive between gigs with another comedian/musician named Jason Cole. We were spinning our songs in the car for each other. And when I brought up Kissing In The Rain the mix just didn’t hold up anymore. I had mixed the original version myself. And since it’s such an important song to me I felt it needed a better treatment. So off it went to Federico and he did a fantastic job with it.
A couple of fun facts about this song… It’s the first time I ever recorded a flute part for a song despite having played in some top notch orchestras over the years. I also hand drew all the artwork for the cover and the lyric video. You can see the video below.
It’s a departure from my regular groove. But if I have to listen to Xmas music it better be really funny or a total bummer. And this one is definitely the latter.
This beautiful depressing piece of holiday cheer(?) by Foxtails Brigade is about losing the Xmas spirit because you’ve gone through all the little rituals so many times they start to lose their meaning. If they even had any meaning in the first place.
But why this? Why now? Why Dave?
Dave Leon and I have been friends since high school. If you know my backstory you know that I started playing the flute at age 8 because my mom told me I’d always been the only boy in the flute section. Which I was. But I never dated another flautist. I did however meet one of my best friends sitting in the section next to me playing clarinet. Dave Leon.
We made plans for a band called Nude Tubas that never came to fruition. We wrote and recorded some really really bizarre/terrible/goofy music (along with my younger brother Ryan) under the name Dissonant Devastation (or something like that). And yes the “or something like that” was an official part of the name.
Lucky for you that music was never released publicly.
We’ve tried a couple other little things over the years but never got them off the ground because our schedules are both so busy. Dave is a fantastic actor and song & dance man in the theater world. Here’s a photo we took while he was performing Trekkie Monster in a production of Avenue Q a few years back.
So when Dave asked me to record a backing track of this Foxtails Brigade song for him to sing at an event I thought we should take the opportunity to release it. All while accidentally exposing the mushy side of our musical tastes.
Give it a listen and enjoy I’m Not Really In The Christmas Mood This Year.
Sweat Pants is now available on all music streaming and download sites!
Let me take you through a little history of this new song “Sweat Pants”… You may have first heard it in a short video during the 30 Second Song Project.
The next version you heard was probably the studio acoustic version from the Itty Bitty Ditty Committee album.
And now you’ve got the full length, fully ridiculous, fully over the top studio recording!
While I was working on the arrangement for the song Eddie Van Halen passed away. Since I already had a David Lee Roth type character in mind for the lead vocal I thought “What if I did this like a lost Van Halen track?”
The odd part being that I was never a big Van Halen guy. Appreciated them, sure. I’m a Dave over Sammy fan just for the fun factor even though Sammy’s the better singer. And I always knew Ed was one of the greatest guitarists ever.
But for some reason they never hit the top of my pops. I think I owned OU812 when I was a kid. Everything else I’d heard on the radio. Which, of course, is still a ton of songs.
So in setting off to do this Van Halen pastiche I had to dive into their catalog and the playing styles of each guy. I settled into some of the early Panama/Jump stuff as a template. Unchained was my main reference as that’s always been one of my favorites by them.
I dialed up a nice 5150 tone in Guitar Rig and jumped into working through Eddie’s guitar parts in those tunes to see how he constructs his stuff. So much going on in there! Being in a quartet like that means the guitarist has to cover a lot of sonic space. And Eddie’s parts would deftly weave beefy riffs with little fiddly fill in bits between the vocal lines. Lots of cool little harmonics, whammy bar dives, and little decorations.
It’s common to double guitar tracks to build up some thickness on a recording. Ed’s playing style is so loose that I was cringing at the idea of have to try and double it. Fortunately a quick Google search told that he felt the same way and never doubled his parts. Yay!
What we did do is use the same panning trick the used for Ed’s guitar on the early stuff. The guitar is almost all in the left channel and the right channel is just the reverb part of it to fill out the stereo spectrum.
I really put my hands through the ringer on this one. I couldn’t do it without some of the fingertap stuff Ed was known for. The main riff has tap parts and the solo has some bent taps at the beginning. Besides all the play throughs to work out the parts I recorded probably a dozen takes before I got something I liked. My fingertips hurt for about a week after I got it done.
Then I dived into Alex Van Halen’s drum work. I’m a way less sophisticated drummer than I am a guitarist. But I managed to pick up some of his trademarks. He liked a 4-on-the-floor kick and 16ths on the hi-hats in places I wouldn’t have thought to use them.
Michael Anthony was always known for that good 8th note chug on the bass. Simple, but effective. My only question was whether he used a pick or fingers. Watch some video, did some searching, and got the answer “Sometimes”. Ok, then. I used fingers.
Those Michael Anthony backing vocals were more important to me. And it was fun to dig into those high harmonies that are loose but still hit close to the right notes.
On the lead vocal I didn’t go full Roth. He’s got a cleaner tone than I generally do on a track like this. And when I tried it clean I didn’t really like the result. So I gritted it up a bit in my style. But I had to do the whole stilted, overacted talking part in the middle. Which of course features a guest appearance by a formerly famous 70’s soul singer.
One interesting video I saw was this one where they guy quantized an old Van Halen track. Most modern music is really locked to a grid. The beats don’t come early or late. But Van Halen played without a click track in the studio so their sense of time is very loose. And it turns out it’s not nearly as good if it’s quantized.
So when I sent the tracks off to my mix engineer, Federico (who loves a good quantization) I said, “Don’t quantize anything!” And he restrained himself to keep the track loosey goosey.
