Hopelessly Lost in Translation
29/07/09
When Paul and I had finished the lead vocal tracking for Hopelessly Lost in Love, I commented that things had gone very smoothly, with a minimum of takes. I thought perhaps I was becoming a more accomplished recording artist, until Paul reminded me that I had been singing the song and he hearing it, “... for as long as I (Paul) can remember.” That is literally the truth. Paul was born in July of 1984. In April of 1985 I was working on an early version of the song in the music room of our first family home. Paul was tearing around the room on his walker (since out-lawed as dangerous, but that’s another topic). In the space of half an hour I had a rough draft of a song. I noticed that I had left the tape recorder on. I first stopped it, then turned it on again to archive a copy of the song. On playback, I discovered that earlier on the tape I had captured a better take of the song than the archive version - so I kept it. But what was even better, the singing and playing was punctuated by shouts from baby Paul, mostly gibberish, but with several clear “da, da’s” - amongst the first he ever said, I think. Right away I knew I had something special, so I took particular care to wrap up the cassette and put it out of harm’s way. I have an mp3 version of the song/baby talk. Should I post it? Let me know.
Over the intervening years I played the song often, and used it in shows done for fun, and in song collections, including in the poetry opera Forever and Now. It is a very upbeat song, and therefore a good climax piece to signal that all is well in the imaginary world - at least until the shit happens (to coin an inelegant phrase). The song has been done in a bunch of different ways; reggae (well, reggae-ish), rock shuffle (with Tony Buchner), hard rock (with Doug Anderson), and even punk! On my 50th birthday, Paul’s band of the time, the Public, surprised me by playing it at one of their concerts. That was way cool!
When the idea came up of replacing poems with songs in the novel, the song was a natural to put in the story at a point where all seemed fine (or fine-ish anyway). The back story is that the book’s musician, Jack, wrote the song in honour; of Jerry’s true blue romance with Heather (straightforwardly), of Gord’s love affair with Elizabeth (warily), and of Jack’s then seemingly pointless pursuit of dream girls (ironically). No re-wording of the lyrics was thought necessary, although the song references the births of a Jane and a Paul - even though having children or not is both an acute and a chronic point in the lives of the characters.
So, what’s the song really about? During my years in the musical wilderness, so to speak, I often set myself challenges about aspects of music that interested me. One early obvious challenge was to write a Three Chord song. Musicians will know what I mean. So I played; A, D, E in a La Bamba-like pattern, only more slowly and without Mexican bounce. Then I sang the first words that came to me. Feeling pretty snug (not to say smug) in my little house with my terrific wife, my two kids, and my beautiful Norman guitar, I imagined the continuance of these good times throughout life - anchored by constancy. A bit of a stretch for somebody then married all of seven years! But it’s not biography, it’s art (or pop music anyway). “Old has-been romance, keeps a rolling on. Baby keeps it easy.” The verse melody then led me to a straightforward set of the chords that are a natural consequence of the first three; F#m, E, D, A “ I keep it strong.” I don’t know how the chorus happened, but the chords are pretty simple too, and easily support the melody; Bm, F#m, G, A. “Time and circumstances change but love remans our one desire. It’s a secret in our hearts. I couldn’t start to tell you why” Then back to the descending set: F#m, E, D, A. “We’re hopelessly lost in love.” Nothing fancy, just sincere. And nearly thirty years later, the condition predicted is still true.
For the novel version, we changed key to G, to facilitate a more countrified or folky or whatever feel. But still in the neighbourhood of soft blues, if you get my drift. We’ll play the song at the Nygard gig on August 17. Come and hear if you’re curious. We hope to post the track on this site real soon.
Over the intervening years I played the song often, and used it in shows done for fun, and in song collections, including in the poetry opera Forever and Now. It is a very upbeat song, and therefore a good climax piece to signal that all is well in the imaginary world - at least until the shit happens (to coin an inelegant phrase). The song has been done in a bunch of different ways; reggae (well, reggae-ish), rock shuffle (with Tony Buchner), hard rock (with Doug Anderson), and even punk! On my 50th birthday, Paul’s band of the time, the Public, surprised me by playing it at one of their concerts. That was way cool!
When the idea came up of replacing poems with songs in the novel, the song was a natural to put in the story at a point where all seemed fine (or fine-ish anyway). The back story is that the book’s musician, Jack, wrote the song in honour; of Jerry’s true blue romance with Heather (straightforwardly), of Gord’s love affair with Elizabeth (warily), and of Jack’s then seemingly pointless pursuit of dream girls (ironically). No re-wording of the lyrics was thought necessary, although the song references the births of a Jane and a Paul - even though having children or not is both an acute and a chronic point in the lives of the characters.
So, what’s the song really about? During my years in the musical wilderness, so to speak, I often set myself challenges about aspects of music that interested me. One early obvious challenge was to write a Three Chord song. Musicians will know what I mean. So I played; A, D, E in a La Bamba-like pattern, only more slowly and without Mexican bounce. Then I sang the first words that came to me. Feeling pretty snug (not to say smug) in my little house with my terrific wife, my two kids, and my beautiful Norman guitar, I imagined the continuance of these good times throughout life - anchored by constancy. A bit of a stretch for somebody then married all of seven years! But it’s not biography, it’s art (or pop music anyway). “Old has-been romance, keeps a rolling on. Baby keeps it easy.” The verse melody then led me to a straightforward set of the chords that are a natural consequence of the first three; F#m, E, D, A “ I keep it strong.” I don’t know how the chorus happened, but the chords are pretty simple too, and easily support the melody; Bm, F#m, G, A. “Time and circumstances change but love remans our one desire. It’s a secret in our hearts. I couldn’t start to tell you why” Then back to the descending set: F#m, E, D, A. “We’re hopelessly lost in love.” Nothing fancy, just sincere. And nearly thirty years later, the condition predicted is still true.
For the novel version, we changed key to G, to facilitate a more countrified or folky or whatever feel. But still in the neighbourhood of soft blues, if you get my drift. We’ll play the song at the Nygard gig on August 17. Come and hear if you’re curious. We hope to post the track on this site real soon.
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