Fambly - take two

Just before the new year my old friend and dial a song collaborator Wilton James came back to my town to visit. I was working on a recording with Joe Reyes one cold night in that nonspace between Xmas and new years eve when Wilton came over semi- unannounced. He had several friends with him and as that I was pretty depressed right then, the introductions, small talk and pleasantries felt like a horrible weight on me. I don't if you've ever felt that way, but at these moments, just paying attention to someone else, in that cursory polite introductory way feels like an asthma attack.

But once Wilton's pals cleared out things really got better. Joe and I had been working on a song called "fambly", a folky bare bones piece inspired by Shirley Jackson's novel We Have Always Lived in the Castle. It's a truly sad, creepy little book that deals with a family that has been poisoned by the strange, youngest daughter. "Fambly" speaks of this but also tries I hope to get at the beauty and comfort that emanates from family, even a dysfunctional one. The word "Fambly" looks kind of like "shambles" to me, and seems fitting as a title -- encompassing the fragility of family.

So we made this kind of ramshackle song, about the importance, the claustrophobia of family, and Wilton's seemingly boundless positivity started to fill the room and the session. He gave the song a listen, and then helped us capture a drum track. Joe beat on the drums while Wilton played the high hat... something that Joe couldn't do at the same time as play a complicated beat. Wilton has very detail oriented ears, and hears the finest details -- he has the ears of a compulsive producer, an obsessionist. Which I remember was a good compliment to my own chaotic maximizing tendendencies. I do the canvass, he does the details.

So Wilton helped us shape my piano part, and then played all the crazy psychadelic guitar overdubs during a key change at the very end of the song. All in all, he poured his heart into the song, very quickly, and made me laugh quite a bit. An antidote to darkness, I tell you.

You can hear the song here.