Feb 2022 nordic-ski-saga
Doing this was so much fun and a lot of work. It was a real stretch for me. Production and mixing are hard with more than one track.
In FAWM 2009 or 2010 I tried to write some long concept album about a young man named Tim who had issues with time. It had all sorts of ideas and themes and non-recorded material. This is my second attempt to do some longer thing, though it is all compressed into a single track. Would be fun to elaborate on it.
I recently met someone whose son Odin was born in Norway and I wanted to write about cold, uncommunicative Norwegian men. But that is a stereotype I have made with only 8 known data points in my life so I decided to add some loving warmth that I always feel better about in the end. Also, the Olympics were going on with lots of crashes so I had to get some of that action in.
I spent a lot of time on this in general. Definitely with Logic, figuring out changes of tempo and keys mid-song. Tried various instruments over MIDI. I have an accordion and was practicing the bits on it but in the end chose simple with fewer mistakes at a keyboard. I'm still practicing the real accordion for when I do this song live in Svalbard. It took me a zillion tries to figure out how and what to sing when. I did way too many vocal doublings but at the end I had such a mess of multitracks and levels and automations that I just had to go with it. I'll redo the whole thing one day. I noodled on changing parts and feel within the song over 3 weeks or so, finally got the entire rhythm track and timing recorded then went back and pieced in all the different acts.
Some outtakes of this song include wanting to pronounce the k in "known" so I could make something like:
I've k-nown Norwegian men
K-nut and Hans, Rune and Sven
but ya know. Another outtake idea was to title this song "Odin the ski bum" and have little rhymes like
my son always remember
the place where you come from
told him Odin don't you be
just another old ski bum
but that was going to get too unwieldy too quickly.
Act I
having been born in Norway
he did not have much of a say
before he even learned to eat
they put skis upon his feet
took him up into the mountains
pushed him down a snowy hill
told him Odin don't you fall down
don't think Odin ever will
won all the races in the village
local kids could only plod
along behind the trail he broke through
a modern viking skier war god
took his talents to the city
even gods have needs to fill
parents told him Odin don't fall
don't think Odin ever will
Act II
everybody knows where the story's going now
going now, going now, going now
a young man on his own
named for a god of war
seeking love and wealth and fame and even more
aiming from Valhalla only had a single life
new icicles blasting in the cold
sweaters pulling off and on
parties every night
concentration and his balance losing hold
weekend rolled around when the qualifiers came
gonna represent his nation in the games
finally get a chance
to show the world the kind of guy
who commands the ice as
easy as the flames
in super G they go
almost ninety miles an hour
can't afford to even
blink a goggled eye
keep your edges and your mind
sharp as nordic battle swords
you won't ever get to have another try
Interlude
told him Odin don't you fall down
told him Odin don't you fall down
told him Odin don't you fall
Act III
history is written
of the skiers who were bitten
by distractions and reactions
that are fully documented
and if you’re a fool to follow
angry gods will duly swallow
you and chew you up
and spit you out
as surely as
a reindeer eats her hay
odin had time to ponder this
and even time to wonder if
the spinning ball of sky and skis
and ground and gloves and arms and knees
would ever start decelerating
how long could he continue waiting
finally the crash had ended
snow and clothes were fully blended
gimpy walk and bloody face
said this would be his final race
but at least he lived to ski another day
another day
Act IV
having been born in Norway
he did not have too much to say
not known for verbal back and forth
they grow them cold up in the north
takes his daughter to the mountains
holds her hand upon the hill
asks her gently please don't fall down
he looks at her
she looks at him
I never will
Odin don't you fall down
Odin don't you fall
Odin don't you fall down
I never will
@thomasfred Mar 2022
You're playing Svalbard? Cool! Good work here. Recording gets easier with every pass. Lots of good info about mixing out there on the internet and it's entirely free. I was figuring a lot of the things you are now this time last year (tempos, time signatures, arrangements also in Logic) and it's way more intuitive now. Best of luck with this extended project!