The Hard Way

Story behind the song:

THE SONG: This is my metaphysical, emotional, spiritual, intellectual theme song... unfortunately for me!

This song was written in 2007, but it was locked in the vaults for a while. When it came time for this album, I knew it had to be on it. The song still felt like I wrote it yesterday... and since I was murdering yesterday... :)

What the song didn't have was the strings... but we'll get to that.... back to the song:

It's probably true for a lot of people... but I feel like I've spent a lot of times in some kind of tug-of-war with God... then I love up and I'm just fighting with myself and God is like "Adam.... c'mon, man...". :) What kind of idiot gets in any kind of battle with God? The human kind. I could go into more detail about this struggle... but I think it would just make the song more mine and less yours. I want it to be yours... by that I mean... I hope that if you find yourself in these kinds of battles.... being a victim of yourself or of the world for that matter... that we can connect through that struggle and maybe through this song. Life is not easy. But the best way for it to be hard, is when you're learning from the bad stuff and growing... inching our way toward love, understanding and grace... for ourselves and each other. Amen.

THE RECORDING: Pretty simple. This song started as just a guitar and vocal. Both recorded with my Telefunken U47 through a Neve mic pre and a distressor. I left both very dry as well... there's just the tiniest bit of super-fast slapback delay on the vocal. Just to give it some space.

When it came time for thew home stretch on this album and I was deciding which songs would have The Section Quartet, this song was screaming for it. I sent the song to Eric Gorfain (violinist/arranger) and said, "Go for it. Do your thing. Make it dark." What he sent back for the arrangement was like 98% what you here on the recording. I was BLOWN AWAY. Jumping out of my skin with excitement. The gypsy-spooky-half-step-gliss crazy intro melody is what dreams are made of. It brought out the surreal-stuck-sticky-darkness of the song in a way I never thought possible. AND, when they were in my studio, they did this in TWO takes. And take one, would've been great too... but man, they are just unreal. It was almost weird... and btw, the other three players were SIGHT READING it.

I still feel like this is one of the songs that's closest to my heart in many ways.

- Adam

Original Release Date: September 21, 2010
Written: 12-26-2007



Written by: Adam Watts
Produced by: Adam Watts
Musicians: All Instruments Played By: Adam Watts
Except:
Strings by The Section Quartet, Arranged Amazingly by Eric Gorfain
Engineered By: Adam Watts
Mixed By: Adam Watts
Mastered By: Adam Watts
Studio: RED DECIBEL WEST, Brea, CA
Label: Dying Ego Records, LLC
Published By: Dying Ego Music (ASCAP) and Seven Peaks Music (ASCAP) administered by Seven Peaks Music (ASCAP).