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Overreaction (2020 Version)
Robert James
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So, what do you think… could it use more wah-wah?
This was written for the 2014 RPM Challenge. The chromatic thing at the beginning had been rattling around in my head for years and years but had never found a home.
The lyrics here are memorable in that they came from reading the @_FloridaMan Twitter account. Each verse was inspired by a different tweet. I thought it was cool to have something resembling a story, and also it was one of the first times I used the internet to sort of force creativity. Unfortunately, @_FloridaMan hasn’t posted in quite a long time. Oh well.
All of the guitar parts are a Gibson ES-335 Pro into a Dunlop Crybaby Wah, a Klon KTR, a Malaise Forever Black Lives Matter into a Vox AC15 and a Fender Bassbreaker 15.
Is it overreaction
when everyone acts that way
does it lead to distraction
when everyone is the same
a simple night at home
relaxing with family
game night and puzzle time
what’s that you just said to me
at night as the anger grows
I’ll pay you back you’ll see
bringing the hammer down
I won’t even hear your pleas
they had this friend they knew
who owned lots of games they played
he liked his collectables
he seemed easy to betray
they wanted to sell his stuff
they had lots of debts to pay
they buried him in concrete
and sold all his stuff away
Its hard to imagine how
these things happen every day
the people you’re closest too
will just throw your life away
there’s no sense of right and wrong
there’s nothing that they can say
there’s evil everywhere
its always been that way
Robert James
said
That plinky little sound in the verses is an organ with some distortion on it. I wanted Jon Lord to play the part but he wasn't available. It's playing eighth notes in the verses and a sustained pad in the chorus. If I remix this I might bring it up. I haven't decided yet. The sound at the end is actually a grunt of frustration. This is the easiest song every written in all of the history of music and it took me 700 takes to get the rhythm guitars right. I was going to cut it out but when the time came I thought it was funny so I left it there.
Sister Savage
said
Love a bit of chromatics :) Very cool bluesy core to this - sounds super sweet to me.
Andrew Russe
said
And that "yeah" - it sounds like an expression of "NAILED it" at the end of a take... and I shall take it as that. But it could so easily be what I tend to capture a lot: a response to a call of "dinner's ready, I've called you three times already" lol
Andrew Russe
said
Or is it actually a keyboard? On second listen I'm wondering whether there's a also a keyboard pad of some sort tying the mix together. Could be guitars, though... anyways, very balanced mix that makes everything shine, especially the vocal.
Andrew Russe
said
Woah! That use of the wah is SO cool. The vocal is a goodie too. I like that guitar doing the plink plink plink kind of piano part thing. The guitars are huge. Love the "yeah!!" (is that what it is?) at the end. Digging this track big time.
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