Song #17: Hey Karl (2009)

When I closed Skyline Recording in 1992, I figured I'd make a living as a freelance engineer/producer. At first it was refreshing to apply my talents in the real world. I worked on a few albums and really enjoyed being in studios as a client, and not as an owner.

What I didn't enjoy was waiting 90 days or longer to get paid. When I owned the recording studio I could use the leverage of not releasing master tapes until payments were received. As a freelancer that leverage disappeared, and the record companies would stall as long as possible to pay me.

I had resisted doing post-production work for film or television because my real love was making music, but as my savings dwindled and frustration grew, I gladly accepted a position as a mixer for ABC Television. The weirdness of mixing commercials for T.V. shows was offset by a steady paycheck, and a few years later I moved to a major film studio to mix commercials and trailers for films.

Eighteen years later I'm still here.

When you work somewhere long enough your co-workers become part of your extended family.
When one of these co-workers "leaves" the company, it can feel like the loss of a loved one; one day they are here, and the next day they are "gone".

I started writing songs for co-workers who left the company to pay tribute to their work, and to deal with the fact I probably would not be seeing them anymore.

Karl was our driver. His political viewpoint is 180 degrees different from mine, and I learned early on not to debate him because I'd run out of steam just as he was getting warmed up. If anything, Karl is knowledgeable and passionate about his beliefs, and I give him props for that... even if he is wrong ;-)

Today Karl is doing great. He works all around town as a driver on lots of hit shows.
He is a good man.

Hey Karl

Ground control to Major Karl

Please turn your engine on

Map the route from A to B

And listen to this song

Objects in your mirrors

May be closer than they seem

And fifty-thousand miles

Can go by just like in a dream

And we hear them scream

Hey Karl 

We've got a real special mission

Can you make it to DG by eight

Hey Karl 

And just a little side trip 

To the cleaners for Jim's suit for his date

Hey Karl 

This fact is not a fiction

Cause the future of our planet's at stake

This is important

You have been chosen

I know you're ready

This is important

Watch your speed around the bend

It's after two at night

Check your mirrors turn signals on

While merging to the right

Doctors and the lawyers

And policeman know it's true

You may not be saving lives

But helping people's dreams come true

It all comes down to you

Britt Bacon: instruments and vocals

Written by Britt Bacon
©2009

Source: DAT

Song #16: Coup d'état (1985)

There is a gold record hanging on a wall of my house I received for work as "a second" (assistant engineer) on Chicago #16. Even though my hands-on engineering for Chicago was minimal, this memento is one of my most cherished.

The band arrived at Skyline Recording in 1982, a little more than a year after we had opened. They hadn't had a hit record for a few years, and Columbia Records had dropped them. My understanding was the band was self-financing this record (no Kickstarter then), and they hired David Foster to produce.

David was (still is) enormously talented musically, but his real strength was his diplomacy navigating the politics of a large band, while gently dragging them toward the modern sounds of a new decade. He could be forceful when needed, while diffusing conflicts with a well-timed joke or ego stroke. 

The engineer was Humberto Gatica, and it was magic to watch this master work. Humberto is pasionate about sound, and he would crawl inside it to flesh out it's essence (sorry; that's the only way I can describe what he does with sound). His mastery of everything from microphone placement to mixing techniques, I still crib from to this day.

Peter Cetera, the voice of Chicago, was the model of what every successful rock star should be.
He pulls up in his 911, gets out perfectly quaffed, and goes to work. He is courteous and gracious to everyone, and this guy CAN REALLY SING.

One evening after Peter had been singing all day, he was having trouble hitting a high harmony note.
I started humming the part to myself, and realized "I could hit that note. Oh shit; what'll I do?".

I exit the control room, go to the bathroom, and sing. I can do it.
Should I tell them?

When I returned to the control room they were packing it up.

This was my first experience working with a band of this stature, and I did not realize at the time how lucky I was. Only later would I understand that not all rock stars, producers, and engineers are as talented, or as generous and humble as these guys were. This was professional show business at a level I have only rarely glimpsed in the years since.

In those days, when an album went gold (or platinum), the record company would send plaques to all participants as a "thank you". Nowadays, if you work on a record that goes gold, you have to buy the plaque yourself.

In 1985 the country was in the middle of Ronald Reagan's residency of the White House, and while certain people of society were doing quite well with his policies, others were not. It was disheartening, if not a little strange, to see homeless people sleeping on bus benches and begging at freeway off-ramps... in the San Fernando valley. 
No "Occupy" movement arose at the time, but there was a sense of dissatisfaction with the status quo.

Teddy and I (coincidentally?) read "One Hundred Years of Solitude" by Gabriel García Márquez, and I had been experimenting with a dissonant chord progression... and a new song was born.

On the inner cover of Chicago II, there is this declaration:  "With this album, we dedicate ourselves, our futures and our energies to the people of the revolution. And the revolution in all of its forms."

And when I was writng the horn parts for Coup d'état, I was definitely thinking about Walter, James and Lee, the soul of Chicago.

Coup d'état

The tailor weaves from seam to seam

Hundred years of solitude

The prisoner moves to make his plea

A hundred years of solitude

While the actor lives another scene

Hundred years of solitude

And to the psychopath it's all a dream

A hundred years of solitude

A thought 

The way it has to be a style

You have to fit to see this reign of mediocrity

Or if you prefer

Coup d'état

What's in is out and what's out ain't free

Hundred years of solitude

To join the club it's a nominal fee

A hundred years of solitude

Well it must be true it's on T.V.

Hundred years of solitude

And when I grow up I wanna be

A hundred years of solitude

A thought 

The way it has to be a style

You have to fit to see this reign of mediocrity

Or if you prefer

Coup d'état

Britt Bacon: vocals, keyboard

Alan Morse: guitar, bgs

Ritt Henn: electric bass

Teddy Zambetti: drums, bgs

I've forgotten the names of the session horn players we hired to play on the song. What a geek. If you guys are out there, please contact me and I will fix the credits.

Written by Britt Bacon and Teddy Zambetti
©1985

Source: 22 track tape (the other 2 tracks were used for automation). Remixed 2013. No auto-tune. 

Song #15: We'll Meet Someday (1996)

By 1996, it was becoming increasingly clear to me that I would never realize my dream of becoming a rock star. I would be turning 40 years old the following year, and my previous bands had broken up. My musician friends were scattered across the country, and I had landed a steady job in Hollywood mixing commercials for the movies.

Every so often though, the muse would call, and inspired by events in my life, I'd have an overwhelming desire to write a song.

I had been visiting my dear friend, Paul Delph, on an irregular basis since his HIV diagnosis in 1993.
I met Paul at Skyline Recording in 1981. He produced and played on many amazing records at Skyline (including his own), and while he was a great client for the studio, his warm and gentle spirit, and uncanny musical chops, always made his presence welcome.
When Ira Ingber and I formed a band in 1982, Paul graciously offered his stellar synthesizer services for our live shows and recordings, and we continued to work together on different projects through the years. (You will hear more of his contributions to my musical life in future posts).

When I got the call that Paul wasn't doing well, I wrote this song, and called Ira.
We recorded the song one afternoon in April, 1996 at Ira's home studio, and I dropped it off at Paul's apartment later that evening.

 

We'll Meet Someday

God made a little seed

And it grew up to be a tree

The branches they touched the sky

Some kids made a tire swing

With a rope on the tree and they'd sing

How God makes everything great

Branches break and promises of no mistakes

Well I'm not perfect but I tell you this we'll meet someday

Sure flunked physics and slept right through theosophy

I don't know nothing but I tell you we'll meet someday

Lying naked on a beach

With the sun and the sand beer in reach

The waves are warm and clear

Going sailing in the sea

With the wind in our face and we feel

How we will always be real

Tidal waves and promises of no mistakes

Well I'm not perfect but I tell you this we'll meet someday

Sure flunked physics and slept right through theosophy

I don't know nothing but I tell you this we'll meet someday

Branches break and promises of no mistakes

Well I'm not perfect but I tell you this we'll meet someday

Sure flunked physics and slept right through theosophy

I don't know nothing but I tell you this we'll meet someday

Diseases suck, but you can still contribute to the "Paul Delph Memorial Scholarship Fund", while enjoying Paul's epic last album, "A God That Can Dance".

Britt Bacon: acoustic guitar, vocals

Ira Ingber: electric guitar, bass, drum programming

Vida Vierra: bg vocals

Written by Britt Bacon

©1996

Source: DAT