Deep Soul

(tw: nudity)

A recording from 2013. I included it in the batch of demos i took to the studio for my third album, but it didn’t seem to fit anywhere. I have a special relationship with this vocal effect. It’s a pitch shift setting in GarageBand called “Deep Soul.” I really credit it with changing my entire approach to writing music. I would spend hours improvising, singing gibberish in this distorted pitch, cycling through reverbs on my voice and synth. It made writing feel very physical and hyper-present. 

In the beginning most of my lyrics were memories or thought of that way. I hovered over my whole life and, from a distance, would draw out bits and pieces to share. Sometimes there was no story, just a confusing feeling i would dig up and fabricate details around until it had a shape that finally made sense. After i had the words i would assign feeling through the music, supporting the lyrics in whatever way felt the most therapeutic.  It was very healing, but very retroactive. Like going back in time to put band-aids on things that happened long ago.

Singing in gibberish and in this pitch-shifted voice liberated me from that method. I started to actually feel like i was in the songs as it they were being made. I didn’t know what they were about but i was about it! I even started to roll around in my home studio, punching walls, stalking around. Before that i just sat there with a little notepad. The entire process started becoming more immediate in every direction. I wrote my song “Queen” right after Onscreen. Now i kind of go back and forth between the two styles, which i think of as math and feeling. Sometimes the math is first and sometimes its the other way around.

I wrote this lullaby 5 years later. I still come back to it, i listen to it a lot. I find it very comforting, like a cozy haunted house. I imagined a gooey creature in a cave singing a sweet song. Like fantasy movies i grew up with that had real darkness but a strong young adult vibe that kept it from being too sinister. The goblin in Legend was evil and tried to blow dart a Unicorn, which is fucked up, but he was very cute and sang little rhymes. I really feel like that, i feel very close to that combination. I think i write a lot to make room for competing feelings to be held up at the same time and not at the expense of one another.

The Lulla video, i am very happy to have found the footage that starts at the last minute of the song. I think it is a very good moment, i am happy to share it. I made the videos when i was on tour in Australia years ago. I was going through a phase where i was watching a lot of soft-core Italian porn on mute. I also compiled footage of 90s male strippers around this time that i would slow down until they stutter. I will share that another day.