New York, NY (Top40 Charts) "Walking Talking," the new single by Inventioning, hit the stores this week and is now available on iTunes, Amazon, Google Music, CDBaby and most major digital outlets.
"You will not be disappointed," says Alison Henderson of Progarchy.com.
Produced by Michael Lewis, this song features virtuoso musicianship, creative production and lead vocals by guest artist Jon Anderson — the voice of Yes.
Michael, tell us about the process behind the creation of this song? I started writing this song in 2010 and finished it in 2011. I was studying Ethiopian Amharic music at the time and researching the various elements that were common to that style. In the process, I found some really inspiring music coming out of East Africa.
But what I found funny about it is that it contained a lot influences from American music with tribal influences woven into it. There were a lot of odd time signatures, along with elements of pop, rock, dance — and even blues! It was fascinating.
So was this song meant to be an Ethiopian Amharic piece? It was, at the very least, influenced by what I heard. Thus all the polyrhythmic percussion that is so prominent throughout the song, the 7/4 time signature, and the dance-style synth at the intro. The original name of Walking Talking was "Tänzälazäla," which — in Amharic — means, "walk aimlessly."
How did you go about writing the song? I built it around a simple four-chord progression for the verse and another four-chord progression in the chorus, added loops and percussion samples, a programmed drum groove, acoustic guitar, a rough bass part and synths. The synth parts were about the only thing that remained intact from the original demo.
I then sent the song to Jon, and he added a lead vocal and lyrics. He sent me his vocal tracks and I finished the arrangement, integrating his parts into the track.
Tell us about the musicians on this song. Brian Fullen is always my first go-to guy when I'm building a production. Brian replaced all the samples with real and exotic percussion. Then he modified and replaced loops and recut the drums with a live performance there at his pro studio in Nashville.
Brian has a phenomenal sense of time — so much so that one audio professional I was working with wondered if this song featured programmed drums because his time is so solid. But it's quite real.
Adam Nitti also added his bass parts from his own studio in Nashville. I had him do several takes and then assembled my favorite parts from those tracks. When the song was being mastered, the mastering engineer said, "It was kind of breathtaking to solo the bass track." Adam is such an amazing player and he added so much life to this track.
Then we have Bridgette Lewis, Inventioning's new lead vocalist, on background vocals for this track. I played the synths, acoustic and electric guitars. I also added a few extra background vocal tracks.
Where was the song recorded and mixed? Everyone cut their parts in their own studios in Nashville and Southern California, and then they sent those parts to me here in Washington
State where I put it all together and mixed it. Bridgette and I work together here in the Northwest, so I produce and engineer her vocals and she'll engineer my vocals and acoustic guitar tracks. I usually work on the electric guitar parts alone — my amp is too cranked up to have anybody else within a city block anyway!
I mixed the song at my studio here, and the mixed parts were then sent to Vestman Mastering in LA for a process called "separation mastering" — which gave us a lot more flexibility in the final stages of production.
I loved working with Vestman, though we (here) got super picky so it ended up taking us awhile to complete the mastering. He would make a tweak, and then I'd hear something that needed changing, so I'd cut a new mix part and send it to him. He'd add it in and we'd repeat the process. We went through about five revisions before we finally approved a master, so it took way longer than I ever dreamed it would. But I'm very happy with the results! There is so much happening in this track and you can hear every nuance. This track sounds amazing!
The song was mastered for iTunes and will also be available as a full HD version in the near future.
