Words: Ian Tanner
Music: Andrew Horrocks, Al Powell, Ian Tanner and Mike Powell
This song grew out of our new-found group-collaboration style we established in 1987, and out of our love for fellow Canadian band Elim Hall. The use of the 6/4 time signature was definitely a nod to both Elim Hall and of course, the Police. The song started with riffs written by Andy, and then grew step by step with each guy contributing something to it. For instance, Al's bass part in the intro inspired me to reference it with the vocal melody too.
Interesting moments to point out:
The "whoas" on the 2nd part of the intro (the Ab to Bb part) were done by session singer Wendy Davis. She was a singer who used to do a lot of corporate work at Cedartree Studio during this era. Wendy and I did quite a bit together during those days because our voices blended in an insanely tight way. I remember Wendy acting like she didn't like me because I could sing higher than she could, but man... her breathy tone was to die for. Years later, I would remember what I learned from hearing Wendy sing. Getting that thick, breathy tone is not easy, and she was a master at it.
The only bad thing about her contribution to this song is, it ended up fighting with what really should have been the focal point of the intro - Andy's guitar part! This was typical of the era, but also typical of my production style at the time, which was to fill up every inch of space with something. I wish I could go back in time and change this!!
To make things even worse, as soon as this section ends, right before the first verse is sung, I started adding all of these annoying keyboard counter-point lines over Andy's main guitar signature!! It becomes an issue of... "what exactly is the listener supposed to hear as most important?!!" I'm not sure we knew the answer to that!! (but God forbid if we had any space in our recordings!!)
The verse begins establishing my desire to make this song as lyrically obtuse and twisted as possible. At the time I really believed these were great lyrics. I'm not so sure I agree now, but at least they weren't as cookie-cutter as our previous album lyrics had been. I was obviously channelling Peter Gabriel circa the "Security" album era!
My favorite aspect of the lyrics is in the rhyming of "soul" and "Sheol" !! Of course, Reunion got the words all wrong on the printed lyric sheet that came with the CD, so none of it makes sense: "You need the spirit interaction in your soul." Sounds like a motivational speaking seminar catch phrase! Oh well... at my age now, I'm so blind that even my prescription reading glasses won't allow me to read the tiny text on that lyric sheet, so probably a lot of people out there in the 80's couldn't read it either and thus, never caught all the type-ohs!!
Back to those Whoas again: One thing I can make a comment on in a real general sense, about the music of the Awakening was this: We had 2 tricks up our sleeves throughout our career. One was the use of Whoas at every opportunity, and the other was a 4 note motif that cropped up in song after song, sometimes even as a joke. More on the 4 note theme later, but for those who can't wait (!!), the notes were G, F#, D, A. Play those 4 notes and you'll hear many different Awakening songs all at once!
Anyway.. back to the Whoas!
I don't know if it was just an 80's thing, or a desire to have stuff that first-time audience listeners could latch onto right away, but we just loved big Whoa sections in our songs. Right from the first song we put on record ("You Can't Hide), right till the very end of our career ("Walking The Halls" from the Lost Album), we used them for dramatic effect.
Get ready, because this album has a truck load!!
This song became a concert staple. We played it at every concert we ever did from this point on. And honestly, without the ability for me to sing and play all those annoying keyboard parts live, the song sounded more authentic live than it did on the album.
Ian - June 14/09
I loved The Awakening, i wish you had more albums and that you were still recording. You knew how to worship and rock. To this day, some of your songs are used in churches to worship with.
ReplyDeleteWrestling is a long-term time favorite of mine. I would LOVE to hear a live version! Thanks for all this info, fun stuff!
ReplyDeleteLong-time,not long-term time. Goofy typo of my own
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