Recording - Terrible Light

"Terrible Light" was the second song I began writing for the upcoming Dark Forest album. It has consistently been one of the songs I've beem most excited about because of its simplicity and dream-like quality. The demo of the song is now up for anyone who wants to give it a listen. Feedback is most appreciated.

The germ of the idea came while I was working on the Dark Forest song. To write the Dark Forest, I was writing all kinds of words that reminded me of a "Dark Forest," and I was having Rachel, our rats, and myself pick out pairs of those words at random to use as lines for the song. At the end of this process, I was left with some unused words, and I had the idea of pairing up the last 8 words and picking out the best two which sounded like a song title for another song altogether. "Terrible Light" was my choice.

Later as I was banging away at the guitar trying to find an augmented chord, I accidently stumbled upon a major 7th chord. I liked the sound, and so I began playing other Major 7th chords which clashed dissonantly with the first chord. This would later become the verse (You haunt my dreams and so on). I also found a major 7th chord which seemed to give such a feel when it was played alternately with the first chord; this formed the chorus of the song. I began writing words, and in a moment of inspiration, I knew this song needed to be "Terrible Light". The song built up in my head for several months.

Early September in 2008 Jesse and I went to record this song (in our first major recording session for the album). He'd heard a demo I'd given him, and he quickly learned the incredibly simple guitar piece. He went into the studio and laid down the guitar chords as well as a complimentary lead piece he came up with (and I liked). Throughout September I worked off and on recording the vocals. For the lead vocal I used two vocal tracks--one that was sung to a sped-up version of the song and pitch-shifted down a half-step, and one that was sung to a slower version of the song and pitch-shifted up a half-step. I then laid down a four-part harmony that was composed of two of the alternating major 7th chords. I spent alot of time mixing it, and then David and I worked together to mix it in his version of Protools. We added reverb to each track to give it a more dream-like qualtiy and compressed the final mix into what is now the demo version of the song. That's about it!