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Background to Songs: I’ll Be Frank, KHT
Written by Jimmy
I’ll Be Frank is the second song off our fourth album, King Henry’s Tears. A wonderful little number from our Discovery Artist, Michael… read more.
Music: The song was born January 15th, 2011 during a morning jam on a cold London wintry morning. Our young discovery artist was late, and Rob and Mike were on time. So we started playing around with a Come Together like bass/drum intro to a song. Michael arrives, says he has a riff – it fits with what Mike and Rob were doing so we kept going. Michael had second song riff as well, so we played around with structure and came up with a two minute song. Group recorded it. Michael added wonderful little piano bit …We added three tracks of Andreas on sax and loved the chaos of the end. A song was born. Here’s what inspired the song:
Lyrics: We sent Michael away after we got the structure down to write lyrics. He came back with ‘I’ll Be Frank.’ We loved it, loved the theives and amphetimines bit. Jimmy was desperate to call the song ‘gaps to claw’ because he loved that lyric, but all voted him down. Michael on lead with Charlotte on backing.
Mix: Easy peasy. The only thing that didn’t quite survive was Michael’s finger in mouth popping sound. Sad. For those of you wondering what a finger popping sound is, here you go:
A moment about the Saxophone: Now, given this is our first time the saxophone has appeared on an SMCC album, we felt it was important to pay tribute to the saxaphone in rock and roll, especially given Clarence Clemons passing. So here you go. Our top 5 uses of a saxaphone in rock and roll and click here for more:
5. Mirror in the Bathroom, The English Beat: Not so much about a solo, the sax is of the song, of the riff and you can’t imagine the song without it.
4. Walk on the Wild Side, Lou Reed. As the female vocals switch to sax, we are witnessing one of the top 5 seconds of music. And the fourth best use of a sax in rock…
3. Baker Street, Gerry Rafferty: Wow, two guys so associated with sax going the same year – hadn’t thought of that. Anyway, the single best use of a sax to start a song..
2. Clarence Clements, Born to Run: He was only going to get the top 2.
1. Clarence Clemons, Jungletown…
And that’s all we have to say about that, other than RIP…
Jimmy