I See You There

Robert James

Sweet Christmas, this puppy is a mess….
….and I LOVE it!

There is actually two mixes going on at once here. I set everything for the beginning and end sections without even listening to the middle. Once I had the two mixed where I could live with it I added the middle in. There are separate tracks for all the rhythm guitars, lead guitars, and vocals for the middle section. Only the bass and drums carry through the whole song without switching to new tracks.

I used a fuzz box for the lead guitar in the middle and had trouble working it into the mix. That’s normal for fuzz boxes but I love the way they sound so I just deal. This was a little rattier than most though.

The feedback tracks and the lead guitar at the end are my ES 335 pro, while everything else is my Les Paul. I used two Fender Bassbreaker amps for all of the rhythm guitars, but only one (the 15 watt) for the leads and the feedback tracks.

The real showpiece for this is the rhythm guitars in the first and last section. The delays were done to tape, not in the mix. I NEVER do delay to tape, but I’ve been having so much fun lately doing dotted eighth note delay tricks with my Wampler Faux Tape Echo pedal that I had to run with it for this one.

The song as a whole was written after I decided to stop writing for the month. I was drifting off to sleep one night and it just came to me, more or less as is. I recorded everything but the lead guitars the next morning. I failed to finish the tracking before leaving for vacation though and I was really afraid I wouldn’t finish it in time to include it on my RPM Challenge album, but thanks to the leap year I was able to get it done.

I don’t think this is a terribly good song, but I am really loving the hell out of it right now. I’ll probably start hating it in a day or two.

9-17
I see you
you’re standing there
I hear you
cry

27-35 Chorus
I see you there
I see you there
I want you here
I want you here

35-51 verse
You can save me
set me free
I can help you
help you see