The Moment of Truth

This next song has been the longest in the making. I started recording it in 2002 and only finished it in 2010. I was satisfied with the instrumentation and arrangement but the original vocals left much to be desired. Originally I had sung the main vocal an octave lower that what you will hear in this version. I didn't like it. It sounded too laid back and wasn't a good match for the subject matter of the lyrics.

I worked on the instrument tracks for much of 2002 and 2003. I was very pleased with the music itself and definitely felt it was my best work up to then. Even to this day it remains one of my favourite songs and I really love the semi-psychedelic folk rock sound I created on it. Even a fellow musician of the reggae/rap genre had shown some interest in sampling the instrumental version for his own music. As far as I know, that never came to pass however.

The drums on this song sound very good to me just as on the previous song. The overall balance of sound and instruments is also very good.

I recorded multiple takes of the vocal track but none every sounded right. So for years I left the song alone until 2010 when I decided to try something different with it. What I tried was to sing the whole song an octave higher than originally planned. To me, that gave the song a much better sound and a sense of urgency that complemented the lyrics. It also made it much more difficult to sing the chorus without going flat. Nonetheless, I think it sounds great. And I added a falsetto harmony track on the verses. Icing on the cake!

Instrumentation includes: acoustic guitar; several electric guitar tracks; electric bass; drums, electronic keyboard (organ sound); and digital piano. The electric guitar used in this song was my very first electric. It was an Epiphone Les Paul Special which I no longer have. I don't have any pictures of it either.

Here is the song:




Since this is one of my personal favourite songs and one of the best sounding ones, I included this song in my 5-song EP which I released in November of 2011. This song can be found on iTunes, Amazon, Spotify and various other music websites.

I never entered this song in any contest mainly because I stopped entering songwriting contests in the mid 2000's and this one was completed in 2010.

On my next post, I will have another one of my favourite songs. It's a song that also took on a life of its own for a while and some people can even sing some lines from its chorus even to this day.