Scotland's singer/songwriter LINS HONEYMAN talks us through the tracks on his forthcoming 'The Secret Diary Of A Tunesmith Vol 2'
The Scottish singer/songwriter connected with Tunesmiths online songwriting collective in 2012 and such was the result of his efforts that his 'The Secret Diary Of A Tunesmith' album gained considerable interest, Cross Rhythms commenting, "The whole thing, though scattershot, is imaginative, creative and definitely worth checking out. . ." Now Honeyman has returned after another exercise in cultural eclecticism and 'The Secret Diary Of A Tunesmith Vol 2' is about to be released. Here is his song-by-song rundown.
"Home Someday Very Soon"
To meet the Tunesmiths
challenge of creating a piece using only percussion and voice, I chose
to revisit my 2013 gospel blues single "Home Someday Very Soon" to
give an alternative take on the song. The recording process started
off at drummer Jon Assheton's house as he beat out a 4/4 rhythm on
cajon. After looping Jon's cajon track, I then added as many
percussive sounds as possible before putting the vocal on. My son Sam
beat boxed on the last half of the song for good measure.
Lins Honeyman: vocals,
cabassa, claves, one shots, triangle, cow bell, tambourine, shaker,
drumsticks, spoons
Jon Assheton: cajon
Sam Honeyman: beat
boxing
"The House"
The brief for this track was to
create a spooky piece of music. This particular piece touches on the
avant garde and uses a fictional dilapidated house as its setting.
Starting with a knock on the door of the deserted building, the
curiosity of a passer-by gets the better of him and he enters a world
of disturbing noises, strange goings on and non-corporeal happenings
before a chase scene leads him to a basement where something not quite
of this world and very probably alien is imprisoned and connected up
to a mass of tangled wires and cobbled together electronic equipment.
Is the being in the basement the cause of the strange goings on
upstairs and does everyone get out alive?
This piece uses a variety of objects including a creaking door,
singing wine glasses, a cutlery drawer, a child's music box and
ticking clocks to create the soundscape. Instruments used include
keyboards and a bass guitar whilst an electric guitar piece makes a
reappearance two decades after I recorded it on a humble four track
recording machine. Also included in the melee is my brother Ross
playing didgeridoo (recorded when I was out in Australia back in 2008)
as well as birdsong, thunder and a "doctored" bass line from my
version of the Doctor Who theme tune - all of which have featured in
previous Tunesmiths outings.
Lins Honeyman: sound effects, keyboard,
piano, cutlery, electric guitar (recorded in 1994), music box, wine
glasses, bass, ticking clock
Ross Honeyman: didgeridoo (recorded
in 2008)
"How Silently"
The Tunesmiths challenge for this
song was to write and record a Christmas song and, having written a
few festive tunes over the years, I wanted to come up with something
that married the events of around 2000 years ago with the here and now
with occasional fleeting references to melodies and lines from those
amazing Christmas carols of old. Opting to keep things simple, I
developed a piano part with each verse containing a different
variation on the main theme and, if you listen carefully, you might
hear hints of "O Come, O Come Emmanuel", "We Three Kings" and "O
Little Town Of Bethlehem". The song was performed at my local church's
Watch Night service in 2014 and has been played live on a number of
other occasions when the season is right.
Lins Honeyman: vocals, piano
"Cruel Thirst"
This time I was asked t write and
record a song with drinking water as its theme. Honing in on the issue
of water shortage and thirst, I used an industrial-sounding drum loop
and built a bass guitar sequence around it before adding layered
keyboards and a Monotron solo. A track most definitely influenced by
the electronic sounds of '80s music.
Lins Honeyman: vocals, bass, keyboards,
Monotron
The spec for this challenge was to write and record an
Indian piece. Not possessing a sitar, tabla or such like, it became
clear that I would have to create an Eastern sound with the
instruments I had at my disposal. As a result, my 6 and 12 string
guitars were tuned to DADDAD to give a richer sound whilst I was able
to make my dobro sound a bit like a sitar. My MIDI keyboard also
provided the tabla percussion sounds and the nearest I could get to a
sarangi at the end. In the middle section, I recycled the sound of
waves at Broughty Ferry beach that I used in the first volume of
Tunesmiths songs whilst my son Sam added the necessary drone sound on
a homemade didgeridoo made out of plastic piping. The title means
"Bharatiya Raga" which is Hindi for "Indian Melody".
Lins Honeyman: 6 &
12 string acoustic guitars, dobro, accordion, drum loop, Indian bells,
chimes, synth
Sam Honeyman: homemade didgeridoo
". . .Dance"
The Tunesmiths brief for this piece
was to write a dance track. The remit was fairly wide on this occasion
and the dance track in question could be anything from techno to
ballet or even a Romanian folk dance. I opted for the more electronic
definition of dance music and, taking a classic club beat as my
starting point, I built up a number of layers to add as much variety
as possible. The "...." in the title reflects the spoken word sections
which try to name as many dance-related words as possible (not all of
them are actually dances!)
Lins Honeyman: synth, voice
"Bad Face"
I'll keep this short. The challenge
was to write a minimalist piece.
Lins Honeyman: synth
"Oh Lonesome Heart"
Another fairly wide brief
this time around with a waltz being the challenge for this
composition. Naturally, I decided to write a country & western
waltz based loosely around the words of the 42nd Psalm. After
recording a basic drum 3/4 pattern on the kit in the music corner of
our church, I then added acoustic guitar, bass, mandolin and accordion
before giving it my very best hillbilly vocal.
Lins Honeyman: vocals,
acoustic guitar, mandolin, accordion, bass, drums
"Positronic"
The next challenge was to compose something
with a "space" theme - partly influenced by the release of The Martian
which was at the cinemas at the time. With a nod to David Bowie - few
artists have done "space" better - I decided to write a tale of
unrequited love with a difference featuring the points of view of the
astronaut and his adrift spaceship. Using my MIDI keyboard to create
the drum loop, layered chords and various sci-fi sounds, I recorded my
vocal before handing over to the on board computer to let her pick up
the story.
Lins
Honeyman: vocals, synth, drum loop
Cynthia Ettick: computer
voice
"This Is What It's Not (A Christmas Rant)"
For
the second time on this collection, the challenge of writing a
Christmas song was suggested and, in contrast to "How Silently" which
was written the previous year, I decided to go for something a bit
more acerbic that decried the commercialism of the season. Designed to
reflect the manic nature of what Christmas has become, the quickfire
barrage of one note phrases is shouted out whilst a Monotron solo adds
to the general mayhem.
Lins Honeyman: vocals, acoustic guitar,
bass, drum loop, organ, Monotron, piccolo ukelele, whistling
"Blues All
Around"
The Tunesmiths challenge that brought about this
piece was to use the La FolĂa chord sequence to write a song. La
Folia was a major musical phenomenon of the baroque era and comprised
a simple 16-bar chord sequence - seen by many as a forerunner of the
12-bar blues. With that in mind, I set some well-known blues
sentiments to the La Folia chord structure to suggest that the blues
were around before the blues were around. Starting off with a
harpsichord sound, it then made sense to invite my wife Jill to play a
stellar recorder solo to add to the overall baroque feel.
Lins Honeyman: vocals,
keyboards, classical guitar, tambourine
Jill Honeyman: recorder
"What Would Blind Willie Think"
Following the
deaths of major names such as David Bowie, Glenn Frey, Natalie Cole
and Alan Rickman at the start of 2016, it was suggested that each
Tunesmiths member write their own tribute to a late artist who has
influenced them. This song pays tribute to one of my all-time musical
heroes - the street singer and gospel bluesman Blind Willie Johnson.
Blind Willie was a hugely important figure in the pre-war blues scene
and was never recognised in his lifetime for the work he did - in
fact, he was left to die in abject poverty. I usually do a Blind
Willie Johnson song or two at most of my gigs and I've often wondered,
if he were somehow to be in the same room, what Blind Willie would
think of how we play his songs. This song poses that question whilst
telling the story of his life. I also tried to include as many Blind
Willie Johnson song titles or lyrics as possible - see if you can spot
them! Also featured at the start are spoken word snippets from a
handful of blues musicians who recorded exclusive excerpts for my
weekly radio show The Gospel Blues Train on what different Blind
Willie Johnson songs meant to them.
Lins Honeyman: vocals, acoustic guitars,
bass, organ, piano
"Keep Talkin'"
Very much home territory for me,
the challenge for this particular track was to record an original 12
bar blues song. I decided to head back into the mists of time and
reinterpret a song I wrote in 1993 when I was 19. In reaction to a
former school friend's tendency to never shut up for more than a
couple of seconds at a time and to spout his suspect opinion all over
the place whilst he was at it, this is a tongue in cheek ditty that
reflected my silent thoughts at the time whilst I was trying to get a
word in edgeways. 23 years later, he's probably still talking.
Lins Honeyman: vocals,
banjo ukelele, acoustic guitar, electric piano, melodica, thumped
door, box of colouring pens, foot tap
Release date: 4th April 2016
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