Not Doing It Myself : Why It Took So Long To Make This Album, Part Two

I have this rule that I won’t put something out into the world if I don’t personally feel that it is at least as good as what I’ve already released, whether it’s a song, a photo, or a video. As I started trying to build the basic bed tracks of the album - guitar, bass, drums - I realized pretty quickly that I needed help. Some tracks had come together easily under my hand, but others were just impossible.

The few tunes that had worked well became basic demos, and in the spring of 2017, I used them to apply for grants to help pay other musicians to assist in filling out everything else. I was funded by the Ontario Arts Council and the City of Windsor’s Arts, Culture, and Heritage Fund. I was not funded by FACTOR this time around, though I had spent years applying and had had nearly half a dozen successes with them around the time of Little Sway. After several FACTOR fails in the making of this new record, I finally had to concede that I don’t have time to spend 40+ hours preparing a most beautiful application - and I did a lot of FACTOR jurying myself, just so I could see what I was up against, and make sure that my applications stood out - only for jurors can dismiss everything I did because someone else didn’t do it for me, and because I wasn’t trying to be a Top 40 artist. It didn’t help that my songs were demos; imagining a better finished product wasn’t that easy, I guess.

The only burning I am doing is burning with indignation when I re-read these comments (even though they are peppered with nice things, it’s obviously the criticisms that stand out).

In the end, I feel like the album I’m making would have pleased a lot of these judges. The songs are so much fuller now, there are little hooks everywhere, and there is no lack of impact anywhere. I am undoubtedly making my best work right now. But I’m still not trying to conquer the world - I don’t want a relentless, anxiety-inducing schedule of touring and voguing and constant scrutiny, and feeling obligated to do what a publicist/booking agent/manager insists so that he can make his money on me. I like to be in charge of my own life, and to be accountable to my listeners alone.

Fortunately, there were other ways of realizing this project. With the support of the OAC and the ACHF, I was able to build the team I really needed - a team of other artists, contributing their musicianship to my album. I’ll still be making every press release, poster, manufacturing layout, booking, shipment, and managerial decision myself, but I genuinely like doing these things. There’s a saying in this business, that it’s better to have a smaller slice of a bigger pie, than it is to have a whole pie to yourself - meaning, you’ll stand to make more money if you have a manager/publicist/label etc., even if they have their hands in your pocket - but I’m not in this for the money. All I’ve ever wanted is to do what I love, and enjoy a normal, middle-class lifestyle - a house, a car, and a family.

Speaking of family, it was on my mind - for a few days in 2016, I had thought I might be pregnant, and I remember first thinking, “oh no, I can’t do this now!”. But then I checked myself: I’m married, healthy; I’m in a good place, why not? I was actually a little sad when I realized I wasn’t pregnant. I guess the only things that might have been holding us back were our precarious finances - two musicians, no reliable paycheques ever - and the fact that we were just enjoying our 20s, and not really thinking about it at all. But we both knew we wanted kids, and eventually, it was just a matter of drawing a line in the sand and saying, okay. This is now.

Camping in Wheatley around those few days in 2016.

By Thanksgiving 2017, I was pregnant and just getting back the happy results of my grants. Wonderful news, all around!

I thought, I’ll get this album done before the baby comes. Perfect.