The Bottom Falls Out of the Clouds

A song about the rain—I seem to write a lot of those—and for the inaugural round of the Mefi Music Challenge.

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posted by cortex (16 comments total)

This came together as an unintentional, belated companion piece to the last track, It's Only Portland When it Rains, on the album I recorded in February. I like the rain very much, and it's just getting to that time of year in Portland where I don't see nearly enough of it for months at a time.

The song is very simple, and the recording very sloppy, but I've been in a recording rut lately and it was nice to just put it together this afternoon.

The guitar track was recorded a few days ago with a Samson C01U in the brief time that I owned it, and is a bit noisier than I'd generally like, but I didn't want to rerecord it and so I decided to just run with it: I recorded with the window open this afternoon, and if you listen close you can hear traffic noise as well as my upstairs neighbor hammering like hell on something. And the kitchen sink at the beginning there.

And in the end, the loose noisiness of it—and the nylon string guitar—works out as a sort of tip of the hat to the great stuff that nicolin has been posting to Music lately.
posted by cortex at 6:30 PM on June 28, 2007

Lyrics:

In Autumn
The rain falls every day
I like it that way
I like it that way

The bottom
Falls out of the clouds
The ground gets wet
The ground gets wet

Water from the sky

The cycle
Carries ever on
I put it in song
I put it in song
I put it in song
posted by cortex at 6:32 PM on June 28, 2007

The vocal harmonies here really remind me of John Vanderslice, which is a good thing as far as I'm concerned. I also like the way this one gets in, does its business, and gets out, no linger.
posted by escabeche at 6:34 PM on June 28, 2007

For some reason I wanted to hear the last line as "I put it in a song" and I like it better that way.
posted by escabeche at 6:35 PM on June 28, 2007

Yeah, short and to the point is sometimes just the way to go. I had thought about filling it out with some sort of instrumental break, but in the end I didn't see what it'd add.

This is also probably the closest I've ever come to writing haiku. A bit wordy and self-absorbed, but still.
posted by cortex at 6:37 PM on June 28, 2007

I hope you don't mind, cortex, but I forwarded this to my wife's class for study in their poetry section. It's 5th grade and I think it's really cool how you can put together a simple verse and write music to it...that's the hook for the kids...they usually hate poetry.

I'm a big fan of short and sweet. I'm a big fan of your harmonies too!
posted by snsranch at 7:20 PM on June 28, 2007

This is one of the few times that I wrote words to a song structure instead of vice versa. Go figure.
posted by cortex at 7:44 PM on June 28, 2007

Cool and succinct.

I had thought about filling it out with some sort of instrumental break, but in the end I didn't see what it'd add.

You hold yourself to a high standard. Roughly 100% of my music is pointless masturbation.
posted by erikgrande at 10:58 PM on June 28, 2007

Nice.
posted by sleepy pete at 9:57 AM on June 29, 2007

(Oh, and home recording protip: don't hold an ungrounded mic in one hand and try to adjust the kitchen faucet with the other. Definitely don't do it, twitch, wonder why your finger is feeling like it has a cramp, and then do it again.)
posted by cortex at 10:45 AM on June 29, 2007

Really nice. It's a shame you had to return that mic, I like the sound a lot. Where did you put it in relation to the guitar?
posted by micayetoca at 11:03 AM on June 29, 2007

About six inches away, centered more or less over the sound hole, maybe an inch off axis and 10 degrees up or so. I didn't really put a lot of thought in to positioning, since it was pretty much the first recording I made with it. I didn't realize at the time that it'd also be the last.

I think I prefer the sound of my Studio B1, but my experience with the Samson was so brief and tainted that it'd hard to say.
posted by cortex at 11:05 AM on June 29, 2007

Great job.
posted by lazaruslong at 5:50 PM on June 29, 2007

well cortex, I'm glad you appreciate what I've been posting. Actually I don't write songs but not because I don't like songs - it's just that I don't know how to write songs. So I really dig it when someone comes up with a song which doesn't sound like something I've heard a thousand times but rather like something with some personality. Then I can make it my own somehow - it just isn't an object anymore.

That's the case with your song here.

Thank you.
posted by nicolin at 12:56 AM on June 30, 2007

Very cool. My favourite song from the challenge. I'd best get off my arse and post one.
posted by chuckdarwin at 1:17 AM on July 5, 2007

This song literally made me cry. And I have absolutely no idea why.
posted by trip and a half at 2:21 PM on July 7, 2007