Far From Here

Ziffler Goes Goth

Far From Here by Ziffler

I have recently taken a job. A job which I thought was going to be a part-time job but has turned into a 60 hour a week job. I'm a mail man. And this seems to be my life now, for now.

And yet last Sunday I found time to write this little gem of a song. Not that it's a great or innovative song, but that it was fun and, quite frankly, easy to write and record. My inspiration was my new job, and how I felt about it. To capture the essence of my new-found exhaustion, I drew upon my inner Cure (note the drums and bass) with a healthy dose of psychedelia.

The song started with the synthesizer which, while it runs through the whole song, can really only be heard in the intro.  The words and melody were written on the fly in one take, though I did re-record the vocals once everything else was in place. The two guitar tracks, played with an e-bow and slide, were also done on the fly, mostly in one take.

I started the song at a very slow tempo of 56 beats per minute. But as I was listening back to the first part, I could imagine a nice drum part sneak up underneath the music. The drive of the drums essentially doubled the feel of the tempo to 112 beats per minute. So I ended up with a nice contrast of the rhythm section providing a driving beat while the melody and guitar counters with a gentle slow pace.

But my favorite part of the song has to be the backing vocal track in the bridge ("Take me from here..."). This is an exact double of the main vocal track but pitch-shifted up an octave with the formant adjusted so it didn't sound like an animated chipmunk. The result is an other-worldly vocal that is, well, kinda creepy. Even creepier is the fact that when you listen to it by itself, it sounds a little like Miss Piggy.

FAR FROM HERE

I want you
To take me home
From here

Lay me down
In the bed
To sleep
And dream

Take me from here
Take me far from here

Rest my head
Rest my soul

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I know, it's a grim outlook on my new job. The first week was an incredibly difficult adjustment for me. But, while I still don't like the long hours, it has gotten easier. Maybe there will be songs about mail boxes and dog bites in future blog posts.

Postman Ziffler