HOLLOWED OUT – the BlackOates-engineered fourth album.  I just played, and they recorded.  That was kind of refreshing.  All songs recorded October 2004 and finished anywhere from summer 2005 to March 2006.

 

1. TIDAL RAVE (5:53) Electric guitar (including the bass line!), piano, drum programming, samples.  This song is supposed to be a kind of surf-meets-techno, where the whole thing is driven by surf-type guitars but with a dance aspect to it.  It makes a decent opener.  Actually, this song was written a long time ago, and was supposed to follow “Linen and Flax” on the Inverse album.  I decided at that time, however, that the album sequenced a lot better without this song, and so I moved it to my next album (which is actually this one; due to my agreement with Clayton to record me; this material was written as my third album, and En Passant was written after that).  The piano part echoes what happens at the end of the album in “Decaving”; I was trying to recreate the feeling of “Attitude (Frozen Mix),” where you have a short chill-out song at the end that mashes together extra elements of the album.

 

2. THERE’S A WORLD (5:00) First guitar lead by Craig Chandler.  Second guitar lead by Braden Pace.  Vocals, acoustic and electric guitars, bass, drum programming.  Just as a note, this song is exactly 5:00:000.  This song is what kicked off the brand of songwriting that permeates Hollowed Out – acoustic-based, but with a touch of rock on it.  As the album developed, “Devil with the Green Eyes” by Matthew Sweet became the touchstone for the entire sound – acoustic songs that have room for all the parts to breathe (particularly the bass – had to bring in New Order influence for that), but then have absolutely chaotic leads.  I wrote the whole song to be somewhat accessible, but be accessible in an EDR style (with the strange chord progression and the little bits of 5/4 time).  I think it turned out pretty nicely.  For the sake of historicity, the verse music is actually 5 and a half years old by now; I wrote it in 2000 initially in a song called “A Song for Andreea” (don’t ask), a song not worth keeping.  The music I wrote there always intrigued me (that 5/4 bit with a G-E-Em chord progression always sounded more accessible than it was), so I reused it here.  Craig’s lead is really good (and the hard-left and middle-panned leads switching to middle and hard-right leads by the end was fun), and Braden’s guest spot is a tribute to him loaning me his POD and Line 6, which saved the album’s electric guitar parts.

 

LYRICS:

 

There’s a world that’s out there behind the doors you see as walls (2x)

 

Step outside for a moment, step outside for awhile

To see the things you could have for your own, if you would leave alone

All the common ordinary things that are in your world, indistinct from what your friends have

Do you understand?

 

CHORUS

 

Step outside to discover that everything in your life

Has been direct resulting of your mind having nothing to find

When the world is rapidly increasing its size and you are left to your own vices

Let your mind expand

 

CHORUS (2.5x)

 

Step outside for a moment, step outside for awhile (4x)

 

3. GARDENER’S BLOSSOM (5:43) Vocals, acoustic and electric guitars, bass, drum programming.  This one is one of my album favorites, as it seems to be the most in a classic EDR vein.  This song is actually about love, but it may not always be seen in the lyrics.  So many people are out there who like the start of a relationship, but not the commitment phase; they seemed to me like people who won’t let romance “blossom.”  And so the song came from that.  I love the lyrics, particularly “but when you see the pistil, don’t shoot yourself in the foot anymore.”  Double meanings are great.  I had a lot of fun with the Peter Hook bass line, particularly the dueling leads in the middle.  The claps are kinda random (and I probably wouldn’t do them now), but I needed something to break the monotony of the lead, and putting a dance influence on the song seemed cool.  Oh well.

 

LYRICS:

Before you push up daisies, you wanna hold on to a flower

So go pick one out, you’re told

You pick one out that hasn’t bloomed yet,

But could grow quite big when you’re old

 

It’s in your orange terra cotta pot

And is blooming like you’ve never seen

But somehow, the petals don’t suit your tastes

They were better inside the bud of green

 

Potential to blossom is all you loved it for

The beginning rocked, but the end you abhor

Who’s an expert in botany?  I know that it’s not me

But when you see the pistil, don’t shoot yourself in the foot anymore

 

Growing is part of every one

You’ll try to nurture in your home

You can’t perpetuate a set of buds,

Not even in a climate-controlled dome

 

So stop being a fickle gardener

Work on what you have right now

You won’t believe the beautiful bloom

You’ll have when true growth is allowed

 

CHORUS 2x

 

Wonders can be seen

When you unleash the bud of green

 

4. TANKTOP (5:33)  Accordion by Ben Spees.  Vocals, backing vocals, acoustic and electric guitar, bass, drum programming, samples.  A song about the excesses of a lot of social clubs, the chorus line which bears the title reminds me, the narrator, that I also run away from it severely, i.e. I’m wearing something simply because you’re not, which isn’t the most logical way to run a life.  The harmony vocals sound really good to me on this song, as well as the multiple acoustic guitar parts, the most unusual use of rimshot I’ve ever heard, and Ben’s incredible accordion.  The accordion/electric guitar harmony and the final chorus are absolutely phenomenal to me.  This song is definitely one of the best of the album, thanks to Ben.  The ABCABC rhyme scheme is nice to me as well – tightly rhyming lyrics are fun for me (don’t forget that the bridge lyrics rhyme too).  In case you’re wondering, the samples in this song are the Bb-Db “tweak” at the end of the Gm chords in the verses.

 

LYRICS:

 

People like to feel that they belong

And have some sort of utility

They wanna know what their place is

 

But what if that place was filled with wrong,

And trying to change it reaped futility?

How long will you ignore evil deeds from darkened faces?

 

Is it too much to ask of you to be clothed in your right mind?

 

I’m wearing a tanktop ‘coz you’re wearing sleeves

And I run in fear from seeing what’s on them

There’s too many attitudes it all signifies

That I do not want spawned onto me

 

People like having lots of power

Particularly over those round about

It’s exclusive – is it therefore hip?

 

How can you see this and not be sour

While Injustice Highway is the main route?

“It’s a lovely day to take a power trip.”

 

Is it too much ask of you to avoid a fatal grind?

 

CHORUS

 

While you’re in your corner, feeling just ducky,

Your defenses fall

I guess if you want to, you can think yourself lucky,

But that would be a lousy call

 

CHORUS

 

5. SUNKEN (5:34) Lead electric guitar by Craig Chandler.  Vocals, acoustic and electric guitars, bass, drum programming.  The second in my “blues series,” though it has some unusual feel.  Craig went way out on a limb on the leads, but that’s fun.  The primary chords in the verses are made up by me (F7-Bmaj7add9, done with a capo on the second fret), so that’s fun.  I think this song wound up pretty nicely, particularly with its electric guitar buildup in the choruses.  Plus I say “aggrandize.”

 

LYRICS:

 

I’ve lived my life for this day

The end of all I’ve done

And now I’d like to thank everyone

For the part they might have played

In building what is me

Especially those who created my vanity

 

I feel alive, but life is feeling so empty

Now I’ve arrived, but it seems that everyone’s left me

So look real close to see the sunken, bereft me

I’m not around to grab my rebound

 

Wasting my potential

Plagued with quicksand eyes

And every small event to aggrandize

All the experiential

Things I have to recall

Never seem to foretell my fall

 

CHORUS 2x

 

6. BECAUSE OF YOU (4:07)  Lead electric guitar by Craig Chandler.  Vocals, acoustic and electric guitar, bass, drum programming.  One of the few songs I can write anymore that feels complete while being around 4 minutes.  I love the 11/8 acoustic part, the bass coming into the pre-chorus, the line “you are the ozone hole in my atmosphere,” Craig Chandler’s incredibly perfect lead, and the way I kinda echoed “Mental Inventory” in the way I built up the last chorus, with the lead guitar taking what was the old vocal melody.  This song’s pretty personal, in that I do things I ought not to do, so I feel like blaming something or somebody; but the only reason that thing is in my life is because…I invited it.

 

LYRICS:

 

Impropriety knocks and it won’t go away - who invited him?

He says he’s here in response to a call yesterday that I made on a whim

 

I was feeling lonely and depressed at the time I made that call

And now you’re standing inside the door – big consequences make me feel small

 

BRIDGE:

You are the ozone hole in my atmosphere

And I am the maker of CFC’s

Shattering dreams of life without fear

And puncturing dreams of a life at ease

 

And it’s all because of you that I fall

But you’re here because I wasted it all (2x)

 

BRIDGE

 

CHORUS

                                                                                                                                      

7. YOU WOULD NEVER UNDERSTAND (4:43)  Opening with a mostly-bass intro to me is pretty cool.  This song is a tad more progressive in song form than the others on this album, so that’s cool to me.  Of course, I take an exercise in polyrhythms in the middle, which is always good stuff.  The fifth v. tritone thing going on in the verses rocks in creating edginess, in my estimation.  The thing I like the most about this song’s spot on the album is how it creates a very different mood than the other stuff on the album – it somewhat hearkens back to “On” in that sense.

 

LYRICS:

 

Why do I explain the way I think

When your mental capacity has done nothing but shrink?

If you thought what I thought, you’d wind up confused

There’s no point for you to take my mind and peruse

 

You would never understand… (2x)

 

Why are you leaving when I tell you the truth?

It’s not my fault the accurate is also the uncouth

Why don’t you like my splendid domain?

The fact that I rule should give you no pain

 

CHORUS

 

I am the king of one – just one nation under my sun

I am the king of one – just me under my sun

(Repeat these two lines a lot)

 

You don’t like me – that much I can see

My condescension has put you in a misery

 

That I may never understand

I may never understand

 

8. HOLLOWED OUT, PART 1 (2:22)  Piano.  Part 1 of the trilogy is a short piano piece I made when practicing piano for class.  It just seemed to work so well, and I wound up playing it a lot that semester.  It sets up the particular hook for when I bring it back at the end of the trilogy.

 

9. HOLLOWED OUT, PART 2 (5:53)  Lead electric guitar by Craig Chandler.  Vocals, piano, samples.  I have no idea what I was thinking when I wrote this song.  I had a horrible time recording this song, and it drags a lot.  That said, Craig did a bang-up job of establishing the inner emptiness and wailing that’s underneath the supposed contentment of the lyrics (“I am number factorial of zero” is classic EDR lyricism, to me).  I was kinda going for a Peter Gabriel “Signal to Noise” vibe with the guitar, and it worked.  Craig went overboard, but it’s okay.  The choir samples work well to me.  The trilogy as a whole is designed to show a man who progresses from a glibly happy yet conflicted soul to one who is at peace with himself when he finds out what meaning really is.

 

LYRICS:

 

I'm the master of making social ties

Courting ladies and hangin' with the guys

Never learning but always having fun

Liking all men, while loved by everyone

 

Having no cares within my day

Never lacking for things to say

Maybe I'll let you be my friend

If I'm feeling in the mood

 

I'm the coolest guy anybody knows

I am number factorial of zero

"First and foremost," my inward soul will cry,

"Get some fun into life before I die"

 

What you see is not boastful pride

It's the sayings of the satisfied

I am good, 'coz friends tell me so

And they wouldn't lie, now would they?

 

10. HOLLOWED OUT, PART 3 (4:40)  Vocals, electric guitar, bass, drum programming.  The man finds peace, and reflects it in similar lyrics to part 2.  The kind of reggae feel in the verses feels good to me from a musical growth standpoint, and I would so very much love to play the instrumental half of this song live.  The drums are awesome to me.  In what is my weakest trilogy/epic to date, this song justifies the existence of the whole song.

 

LYRICS:

 

I've been asking to find what makes up me

All I've found is that my friends disagree,

Having never seen how I stand out

They have no clue of what I'm all about

 

Center of attention, but nothing else

Like a good heart or knowledge of myself

Maybe my life is hollowed out

Just an icky, mushy core is left

 

Of the substance I used to have in me

That which made up my true identity

"First and foremost," my inward soul cries,

"Find some redemption from flattery and lies"

 

What you see is a loss of pride

Social life is no longer guide

I can be saved - He wrote me so

And He cannot lie, now can He?

 

11. DECAVING (3:00)  Vocals, acoustic guitar, bass.  A short and sweet closer.  I loved putting the dark 5-string bass down at the bottom of this thing.  The guitar tuning is my own drone tuning.  This song is one of the highlights of the album.

 

LYRICS:

 

When my world is caving

When my world needs saving

When it needs erasing

You are there

 

When I’m feeling all alone

When in Brainville no one’s home

When I am the opponent of all

You are there

 

CONCLUDING THOUGHTS: While I love how this album sounds in terms of recording values, and several of the songs sound really great as full-on rock (besides that the album is pretty much one long Matthew Sweet tribute, which can’t be all bad), this album is uncharacteristically one-sided for my style.  As I put in these lyrics, I noticed just how few of them I wrote this time around, not in amount of songs, but length of them.  There are several shining moments on this album, though, and I’m glad that I got to hear myself with real recording.  The acoustic drum samples are nice, too.