Songwriting stories: #2: Equisa - Strange Release
Before we dive into Songs of Seas and Oceans I wanted to deconstruct Strange Release, the title track of Equisa’s debut album. My personal favorite track of the record. Sometimes it just happens. You are at a random location and inspiration strikes. In this case, I was showering and the line “Strange release of your anger” came to mind first, picturing someone who keeps all inside and finally flips out in the strangest ways. Next came the vocal melody in the chorus paired with the chords. Personally I have the luxury of perfect pitch so I could immediately transcribe the chords in my head as I G#m I Bsus2 I Esus2 I C#7sus2 I. Shower off, Pro Tools on and demo time. I knew with the concept of someone holding everything in and flipping out at the end the song needed a sudden climax after a fairly calm half-song in which nothing seems ‘wrong’. There was my structure. One of the songs that really inspired me around that time was Periphery’s “Jetpacks was Yes”, especially the clean guitar which runs throughout the whole song without really noticing it. I also wanted a melody running through the entire song to bind everything together without getting boring. I wrote that rhodes intro first, as we were working with a keyboard-player at the time who was capable of such parts. Skills of my fellow bandmates often inspire me. It was an easy move to fill it with the chords on clean guitar and bass as it makes it very soft and comfortable. For a verse I wanted something even chiller so I decided to play the melody on a muted U2-ish delayed guitar and keep the bass steady on the G# throughout the whole chord progression. I took the intro as a chorus and copy pasted up until the bridge. There I wanted the flipout, so I put the melody in a leadsynth so I could put open distorted chords underneath. Petra, Joost and I sing great in harmony and it has become a staple in Equisa’s sound, so stacking our voices in these harmonies where all of us pushed our limits would make it sound like a great flipout! I also changed the Bsus2 to an Asus2 to create a more dark and sinister undertone compared to the first half of the song. As final choruses I wanted the drums to kick back in and placed the melody once again in the synths. It took a while for me to find a cool sound for it and after experimentation I settled on pizzicato strings. With 80% of Equisa’s music this is where I hand it over to Petra to write lyrics and the remaining (often all) vocal melodies. And in some cases, such as this case, Petra’s approach demands rearranging of the song. For example: her verses were twice as long, so I doubled them and put the guitars only in the second half to create a tender build up. Then she wrote a pre chorus on my initial chorus and saved my vocal melody for a chorus after that, which didn’t exist at that time. It had to be bigger than the pre chorus but the flipout still had to be big! After some headaches I came up with the ‘transistor-distorted’ guitar, the strings and the open hi-hat to tense things up without giving it all away. Lastly Petra wanted Joost and me to sing the regular chorus in the end while she put ad libs in between. I love the outcome of this song. As I said: it’s my favorite of the album. I also really like its story: I had a great start and felt really strong about it, then along came Petra to throw everything around and after my stubbornness finally gave in the song really blossomed!