five missing one (part 2): kickstarting bobtown

In my last post, I talked about writing "Five Missing One," which started as a project to translate an Israeli song from Hebrew to English, and ended with me writing a full-fledged song that stood apart from the Israeli work. And I ended up with a rough demo produced in a friend's bedroom.

Enter Bobtown.

Bobtown is New York (Brooklyn?) based band that does a mix of country and folk, with a heavy does of harmony. When I first heard of them they had two albums out. They had funded the second through Kickstarter, and I was bummed that I hadn't heard of them in time to use their Kickstarter campaign to get a demo of one of my songs. To get a taste of Bobtown, enjoy the following video of them doing "Kentucky Graveyard," which is my favorite song of theirs:

When they announced a Kickstarter to fund a third album, I was over that like frosting on a Poptart. DFor the right pledge I could have them record a usable demo of one of my songs. In my arsenal I already had a demo, produced by Wreckless Eric and Amy Rigby of another one of my songs ("Do You Think of Me (Now and Again)" -- that'll be another blogpost or two). The only question was what to have them record. I had a few finished songs and a few more that were nearing completion that I could prioritize. But I decided to go with "Five Missing One."

In some ways it was an illogical choice. I already had a demo of the song, albeit a flawed one. But there were three considerations that won the day:

1. The demo I had was rough -- possibly too rough to use for selling the song. But good enough to provide to them as a guide for the melody.
2. The song was a Western-style (or so I thought) story song, which seemed to me well-suited for Bobtown
3. I hated -- hated hated hated -- one line in the rough demo. In the final chorus I had the line "We're each other's fathers, brothers, sons." It was a hastily-written line meant to emphasize how the "we" of the song are extremely close. But it didn't sound right to me. After recording the rough demo I came up witjh the alternate, "We ride until the riding's done" which I liked better.

So I sent Bobtown a lyric sheet and the rough demo. Then I made a mistake. Since the song was originally inspired by "חמישה פחות אחד" ("Five Less One") by Benny's Friends. So in my head my idea of what the song should sound like was heavily influenced by that song. So I emailed one of Bobtown -- I forget who my primary contact was with -- to suggest what the arrangement should sound like. At the time, I couldn't find a video of the Benny's Friend's song, so instead I sent a link to "שירת הרוכבים" ("Caravan of Riders") by Hadooda'im and said I thought that my song should be stylistically like it. This is the song in question:

I shouldn't have gone there. Bobtown has their own style, and it's not the same as Hadooda'im's. Some days later I realized my error and wrote back to Bobtown that they should ignore the Dooda'im video, and arrange the song as they see fit. They're professionals. They're experts. And part of what I like about them is their talent for arrangement,

In due course, I got my demo. It's here as a lyric video:

Bobtown added some flourishes at then, and a vocal intro that I hadn't contemplated. And they changed a few words here and there. But the really important thing is that what they recorded sounds like a Bobtown recording. If they had followed my suggestion that they style it after the Dooda'im song, it would have sounded great, and I would have been happy. But this is much better.

Of course, that wasn't the end of the Kickstarter rewards. I also got copies of their first two albums (which I gave to a friend who I felt would like them) and the new album (which I kept. Duh!). I note that the new album has "Kentucky Graveyard" on it, which I consider a victory. There was also a Bobtown shirt (which one of my cats has since peed on -- sorry, guys) and pin. But what was really great (stuffwise) was a collection of early demos of the songs on the new album. I just love that kind of stuff -- early demo versions of songs I know and love. I find it fascinating to see how something developed, and I have shelled out money for album rereleases because they included early demos. I downloaded the demos, and intended to  burn them onto CD. Since the new album was called A History of Ghosts, I figurwed I'd call the disc of demos A History of a History of Ghosts. You see, the OCD side of me won;t let me consider a recording to be part of my music collection unless I have it on a disc. It can be a homemade disc that I titled myself, but it has to be a disc. Unfortunately, some of those demos couldn't make their way onto a disc -- I got a message that I wasn't authorized to burn it. :(. So those tracks remain on my computer, but I haven't been able to think of them as part of my music collection.

I attended an album release party in Manhattan, at which they went through all the songs on the album. It was a good show, though the firend who was going to go with me bagged, citing exhaustion.

Finally, some time after that, Bobtown reminded me that I was still owed free admission to a concert. I didn't realize that, but -- hay, free concert. So they put me down for a show in Brooklyn on a weekend evening. I was to go with my daughter. That proved to be bad timing. We (the family) had been in Washington, DC, the night before, and were driving home during the day. No problem. Until we got home. D ead cat. It wasn't one of our cats -- it was one we were catsitting for. Never catsit for a 25-year-old cat. 25-year-old cats have really high forces of mortality. And if you do catsit for a 25-year-old cat during the summer when it's hot, don't go away overnight. Anyway, before heading off to the concert, I had to dig the grave. We weren't burying the cat yet -- we were catsitting him because he belonged to a boy whose mother had just died (yup, just whern you thought it couldn't get worse) and the boy couldn't take the cat with him where he was living. We couldn't bury him without giving the boy a chance to come and say his goodbyes.

A trip to Brooklyn for the concert, but my daughter and I weren't in the mood. It was a decent show. Ken Waldman (Alaska's fiddling poet) was also performing, accompanied by Charlie Shaw, without whom I wouldn't know about Bobtown. I spent a few minutes chatting with Fred Stesney (Bobtown's bassist) who told me that they recordedd "Kentucky Graveyard" for the new album in part because I had suggested it, Yay! But I was exhausted and my daughter was feeling sick, so we left during an intermission. It was an anticlimactic end to my experience as one of the band's Kickstarter supporters. But the fact is I got that great demo, which is what I wanted in the first place. Everything else was gravy.

I really have to go see Bobtown perform again -- they put on a great show. But between family and work, it's hard to find the time. Heck, I skipped seeing Nick Lowe when he was in town recently, and I won't be going to see Wreckless Eric this Sunday when he's in New York. C'est la vie.

But, Bobtown, thanks for a great demo.