What is Fresh Friday, you ask? It’s simple really.
Every Friday I post some music. Probably music that I made. I tell you a little about the music, how I wrote it, how I recorded it, etc. etc. Then, you listen to it and comment on it. Sounds easy enough, right?
Today’s Fresh Friday is a two-in-one kickoff, a song and another related song put together in one track. This might make it to an album someday, who knows.
Bill Eager – Apollo/Bacchus
This song is called Apollo, but there’s another “companion” track called Bacchus that goes along with it, an instrumental.
This song falls into the realm of the rest of the Mars/Coma Cluster business in a way, and talks about discovering a special someone in your life and warming up to them, and them warming up to you. It’s also about how discovering that special someone can seem like a conquest, and how the experience can make you feel intoxicated.
I first recorded Apollo in mid-2008, after Coma Cluster came out and I was swimming in new ideas. I was looking for a simple rock backbeat and a clean guitar to go with the melody, and I was hoping to really open up the song with thick, layered guitars. I actually got one of the thickest, strongest guitar sounds in the song when the chorus breaks in. If you turn it up, it’s just “there”, like a wall of sound in one track. The last thing I wanted to get was a little interplay between the guitar lead and the vocals, which comes in after the solo.
Naturally, I outfitted it with some orchestration and got more and more subtle as I worked on. Eventually I got what I wanted out of the song, but I still think I could come back to it and improve on it, or redo the vocals better.
The idea for Bacchus came later though, and I decided that, after listening to the song, I didn’t feel quite “fulfilled” in the feeling of the song. So I decided to fade back in with a little instrumental with the same idea. I got inspired to do this long ago listening to Sigur Rós’s Takk…, particularly what you get between Hoppípolla and Með Blóðnasir.
Apollo
I’d cross the universe to get to you
And there’s not a world I won’t destroy for you
I’ll be your spacesuit Napoleon
I’ll give you anything you want
But could you want me?
When I was just a little child I though I’d measure you
I’d fly around the world to get to you
I was a lunar module
On a cold orbiting soul
When I explored you
You were an undeveloped sphere
And I floated ever nearer there toward you
Two years, I’m still here
I’m waiting on the signs of life
But so far the radar is showing none in sight
Carried through the black hole
Will we recognize each other when it’s over?
Stranded in a black hole
Will we realize we’re choking when we’re out there?
Carried through the black hole
Will we recognize each other when it’s over?
I’d cross the universe to get to you
And there’s not a world I won’t destroy for you
Apollo/Bacchus by Bill Eager is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
Tags: apollo, bacchus, Fresh Friday, mp3, Music
This is one of my favorite stand alone tracks, along with its “partner” Paraffin. Or maybe I just consider them that way because I found them posted together…