Tuesday, April 30, 2013

Evolution of a song: Devil Town

My Attorney have a song called Devil Town, which has evolved through several stages.

First there was the gritty-sounding demo, first tracked onto dictaphone at Andy's old house.  It would have hailed from a time before My Attorney were a performing band; both of us living in Newcastle, but yet to meet Ian and Stuart.




Once the band had become a four piece, the song was worked upon again.  The preferred version was a rambling arrangement that featured a long guitar solo during the outro.  It was only ever played in public once:




However, parallel to this version, was the studio edit, which with its pots and pans percussion again offered up a new slant on the original arrangement.


The recording was done under hurried circumstances during the LP4 sessions; a time that saw the band struggle with the technical implications of working in a remote cottage, that affected much of the guitar tuning.  Therefore the blip below is from a working mix that is yet to receive fresh six string overdubs from Andy: