"She’s Not Getting It"
(Note to my male readers:
Do not turn back at the words, “wedding shower.”
There is a pay-off if you stick with me.)
Approximately this time last year I was madly preparing for my wedding and the start of my job with Sarah McLachlan which began shortly thereafter. With the timing of the tour my husband and I weren’t going to have a honeymoon unless we did something drastic.
Solution: elope to St Lucia to be married on the beach, just the two of us for one week. Return to Toronto and have a winter wedding re-enactment ceremony and huge party with our family and friends exactly one week later. This was a good plan but one that required understanding parents, a lot of planning and help from our friends.
Case in point:
I said to my best girlfriend Vid, “you might think this is weird because you know I’m not a girly-girl who has dreamed of her wedding day all her life, but I actually do think I’d like to have a wedding shower so I can hang out with all my girlfriends and my mom before I get married and go on tour.” I asked her if she would organise it. She told me she was a little surprised that I wanted a wedding shower but that she could understand my logic, and would put it together for me if I gave her all the names and numbers of the invitees. I gave her a list of about 15 women.
I didn’t hear anything about for a little while and being a bit of a control freak I checked back in with her until she said, “you asked me to do it and I’m on it. Leave it with me.” I left it with her. Shortly after that she gave me a date: an evening in January in between the elopement trip and the Toronto wedding. A bit mad but do-able. I made a note of it and continued wrapping things up: getting ready to elope, recording the last of my vocals on my 3rd solo CD, doing sessions for other people, making sure the Toronto wedding bash was coming together and learning Sarah M. songs. A busy time.
A couple of weeks before our St Lucia wedding trip I got a phone call from my friend, producer/composer Creighton Doane.
“Katy? Creighty. I know you’re going crazy but there’s a session I’d love to book you on the week after next that would take you, like 20 minutes and I could throw you a couple hundred bucks. What do ya think?”
Creighton always talks really fast. He gave me a bit of background on what the session was for. Something like the client is a producer from Montreal who needs to clean up some vocals on a track for one of his artists, he’s a friend of our mutual friend and producer Danny but Danny’s busy so Creighton’s helping him out...
...I don't know, he said it so fast I didn't really catch it but I love working with Creighton and I just figured I’d get the story straight on the day. Anyone else calling to book me on a session at that particular time and I might have said no, but I always say yes to Creighton and Danny because it’s always a guaranteed fun time. Creighton and Danny are very talented composers and studio business partners. I have worked with them a lot over the years on jingles, album backups and some side projects in our spare time.
The session was booked for 5pm two weeks hence. Creighton called me one more time closer to the day to change it to 7pm. I was home all day that day cleaning up and packing for the trip. I ran out of time to wash my hair but I managed to put it up and throw on a blazer and a little makeup to look professional for the client. I called a taxi and arrived on time.
When I got there Creighton introduced me to the client, Glen, who was a tall, handsome man with a hint of a Jamaican accent, dressed formally for the occasion in a suit and tie and behaving a little on the serious side. When I meet new clients for the first time I usually try to break the ice with them in under five minutes. In the case of this client my first move was to make a little joke about how “I was glad I wore my blazer now that I see your outfit”, referring to his suit and tie. In reality I was getting almost an uptight vibe from the guy. A bit of a tough nut to crack but I never back down from a challenge.
Creighton took us into the control room. Glen was apparently the manager of the artist who was from Montreal. He sat down and didn’t really say much. Creighton did most of the talking. He told me a woman had already sung the female part on the track but that she wasn’t very good and that they wanted me to replace her vocals. He said the artist and track was kind of like a “Shaggy”, R&B thing. He handed me the lyric sheet. It said “This”, Words & Music by Raza Kah. He played me the track.
The song started with a spacy pad, which led into an R&B groove and then a woman’s voice kept singing the word: “This”, in between lines sung by a gruff rasta voice in a patois which did remind me of Shaggy, and then the girl sang, “Baby, baby, baby” at the end of the Chorus. That was it. They said they didn’t need any female vocals on the Verses or the Bridge. I realised then that I had come all the way across town just to sing the words:
“THIS?... THIS?... THIS?
BABY, BABY, BABY”
and this struck me as funny considering how up to my neck I was in my own life at that moment, but I told myself to get a grip. I also thought, oh well, this is easy and should go quick.
The male lead vocals were in a very thick rasta dialect and I’m a nice Jewish girl from Thornhill just trying to make a buck, so I didn’t make any jokes about the “Me no wanna hear bout Bozo the Clown” line in Verse 1, which I would have done for certain if it was just myself and Creighton in the room.
The song seemed kind of goofy, but if I had a dime for every time I have had to keep a straight face while singing on tracks of questionable quality over the course of my career, welI, I’d sure have a pretty big dime collection. Yes Sir, I sure would.
The trick is to always remain professional and save certain laughs for later. The girl they already had on the track did sound pretty lame. The track was in a good key for me and it seemed fairly obvious what they were looking for: a soulful female voice interjecting with the gruff male voice on the Choruses.
I kept all of these thoughts totally to myself and said, “That sounds great. I think I know what you mean. Shall we try it?”
I went into the next room onto the recording floor. I could see them through the big glass window.
We set the levels in my headphones and I went for it. Soulful female vocals on an R&B track: comin’ right up.
I heard the pad, then the groove and I sang,
“THIS?”
(The man’s voice growled: “You-gotta-get-up-on-to-it”)
“THIS?” sang I.
(He gruffed: “But-don't-you-pretend-you-don't-do-it“)
“THIS?”
(“You-got-to-put-your-mind-to-it”, he monotoned.)
“BABY, BABY, BABY” (I offered, with soul.)
Creighton stopped the tape. In the talkback mic he said, “That was good. How did that feel?”
I said, “Good, I think. Is that the idea?”
“Yeah. Sounds great. You rock, Katy. What do you need, do you need more of anything?”
“Maybe a bit more of me but it sounds good.”
“Okay, let’s go for it. I’ll give you a little less pre-roll this time.”
“Okay cool.”
“Okay... this is how much you’ll hear and then you’re in. Four bars.”
“Okey dokey.”
“Here we go.”
He rolled track again.
“THIS?”
“THIS?”
“THIS?”
“BABY, BABY, BABY”
“Right on, that’s great. Uh, Glen is just saying maybe try it a little more, uh... here, he’ll tell ya.” Creighton told Glen to go ahead and talk to me in the talkback mic.
“Hey... that’s great. What do you think about singing it a little higher?” asked Glen.
“Uh-huh, I can do that.”
(Always be positive, especially when you think they don’t know what they’re talking about or when they might not know exactly how to ask for what they want.)
I went on, “Do you mean like, instead of the melody? Or that you might want me to stack a few parts with a high part in there?”
There was a pause in the control room while Creighton and Glen discussed it.
(FYI: the thing about the talkback mic in a session is that it is used at the jurisdiction of the engineer/producer. In other words, unless they want you to hear what is being said in the control room, you will not hear it. If I had a dime for every minute I’ve spent watching people’s lips move through the glass after a take, and wondering if (a) they have forgotten I’m still in there or (b) whether it’s possible to pass out from lack of oxygen after spending so long in a vocal booth, well, I just might need a whole other jar for all those dimes. Yes indeedy.)
“Yeah, uh, on it’s own we think,” Creighton eventually replied.
“Okay, so, like a third-up then?” I sang it in the air. “Like that?”
“Yeah try that.”
He rolled the track. I sang,
“THIS?”
“THIS?”
“THIS?”
“BABY, BABY, BABY”
a third-up from the melody. To me it sounded like a harmony missing a melody but I waited for the verdict.
After more brief (private) discussion, I heard Creighton say, “So are you good with that, Glen?”
“Can she go a bit higher?” asked Glen.
Are YOU high? I thought to myself. “Sure I can. So, like a fifth-up then? Like this?”
“THIS”, I sang, a fifth-up from the melody. Up there my voice was starting to get a little breathier. I said, “if you want it brassier I can project more, otherwise as you can hear it’s getting a little more breathy up there. Do you have a preference?”
A pause.
“Just give it a try, yeah, try it breathy.”
He rolled tape. I tried it breathy.
A slightly longer pause.
“Can you go back to the melody but up the octave, Katy? Is that too high?”
“No, I can hit that, I think.” I tried it in the air. It was the highest note so far. I could get it but it sounded like a shadowy top part you'd add to a bunch of other parts, not use on its' own. “Same concern as last time, though, just that it’s a naturally breathy note unless I belt it.”
They talked it over. “No, keep it soft. Let’s try one.”
“Okay.”
We tried one. I kept it soft. Waited for the word. Dum-de-dum-de-dum...
“Glen’s got a thought, Katy.”
“What about more like Tina Turner?” suggested Glen.
Okay. Yeah. “Okay, yeah. So, you mean bigger and brassier sounding?”
“Yeah, try that.”
We tried that. Way up that high it was sounding silly and I was feeling a bit silly.
“Yeah. Stick with the Tina Turner thing, but breathier.”
This sounded like a contradiction in terms and by now the session was starting to lose it’s “New Car Smell”. Losing My Patience was around the corner. Bridezilla was in danger of rearing her ugly veiled head. THIS? THIS? THIS? BABY, BABY, BABY? How could something so simple on something so crappy become so complicated?
Okay. Be cool. You are going to St Lucia in 2 days to get married and this session WILL be over by then. Just focus on the rules... let’s see... Right. Session Singer Rulebook, Rule # 1: Never Let Them See You Sweat.
(There are many Rules, but the rest of the Top 3:
Rule # 2: Never have bad breath.
Rule # 3: Memorize your GST Number.)
“Sure. Tina Turner but breathier. I’m actually curious to try that. Let’s see what happens.”
We rolled tape. I gave it my best shot. Sorry Tina.
Another private conference in the control room, but not before a bit of sloppy talkback-mic-muting allowed me to overhear a snippet of Glen telling Creighton, “she’s not getting it.”
Did he say SHE’S NOT GETTING IT?
“She’s not getting it?” flew out of my mouth before I could control it, but I quickly checked myself. That could have been the last straw, but like I said, I never back down from a challenge. I have polished a lot of turds, as they say, and damn it if I wasn’t going to make this one gleam.
I remained poised, or something close to it. The two men were now in deep discussion. What next? ‘Could you try it like Janis Joplin meets James Taylor?’, he asked me in my fantasy. ‘No problem you weirdo’, I replied in my fantasy. I was surprised the guy hadn’t yet said, ‘Could you sound more black?’, which is a common request I have gotten many times for many years and it still always shocks me.
Suddenly they made contact. “Glen’s gonna come in and show you what’s he's after,” said my friend Creighton. Creighton, you’re killin’ me here.
“Okay good”, said I.
Creighton opened the door and let Glen in, saying, “Do you want a water? I’ll go grab you one.” Creighton took off like a shot. Where’s the fire, I thought. Don’t be long with that water, I thought.
Glen said, “I think I know how to explain what I want. Let me show you.”
He walked over to one of the wheeled partition walls behind me. These are called “baffles”. They are used to create the effect of having a vocal booth when you are recording vocals on a larger recording floor. They localise the travel of voices in the recording session so the sound doesn’t fly around too much before making contact with the microphone.
He wheeled the wall back a bit, revealing a chair with a boombox on it. I’d worked in this studio many times before and had never seen a boombox on the recording floor. ‘That’s weird’, I thought.
He walked over to the boombox and pressed Play. The track we were working on started up. ‘That’s weird’, I thought. ‘If he wants to play me the track why didn’t they just call me into the control room where we could all hear it and talk about my part? What the hell is this boombox doing here?’
I waited for him to show me what he wanted me to do. He loosened his tie. He opened his suit jacket. He started dancing. Slow dancing. He was looking into my eyes, and he was coming right at me.
‘Holy shit’, I thought. ‘Is he trying to tell me to loosen up or something? So I’ll sing it better or something? I don’t have time for this. This is unprofessional! Oh-my-god-he’s-coming-right-at-me.’
I started laughing nervous laughter. My eyes were probably bugging out of my head. At the same time it was sort of fascinating. I thought he was like, some serious uptight dude. Now it’s like he just downed a mickey in the last 10 minutes. What gives? If he gets any closer I WILL freak right out.
He got closer. Now he was all up in my face, looking into my eyes. He took off his eyeglasses. He started slow-shimmying his suit jacket around, trying to wrap it around me. I snapped out of my shocked trance. I put my hand on his chest, pushed him back and said, “What the fuck?!”
I screamed Creighton’s name.
At that moment I saw my mother and 15 women pour out of an adjoining room.
This was my surprise Bachelorette Party, not the tame little wedding shower Vid told me we’d be having next week when I got back from St Lucia.
Turns out that when I first asked her to help me plan a wedding shower, Vid had long since been concocting her evil, delicious plan to royally fool my unsuspecting ass. She had pretended to act surprised that I wanted a wedding shower so I wouldn't suspect her of anything.
I had been Punk’d.
I fell down on the floor crying and they had to help me up.
I guess the stress of getting everything together before our two weddings and the world tour just came pouring out and wouldn’t stop, because:
I burst into tears when the appearance of my mother and all my girlfriends at such an unlikely time and place made me realize that I am a massively gullible dummy,
and
I sobbed all the way through Glen’s Oscar-worthy transformation from an uptight, suited-down bespectacled Music Industry Weazel to an absolutely gorgeous Seal-like specimen of male beauty. He was a professional exotic dancer/stripper whom Vid had hired, who proceeded to do a full strip-show/lap dance for me, right down to the G string, me crying my eyes out and laughing the whole time.
I whimpered when I realised:
That when Creighton and Glen had been talking privately to each other in the control room in between my takes, Creighton had actually been coaching Glen on what to say to me next,
and
during the session, which went on twice as long as they were told it would before they could yell Surprise, all the girls were crouched down in the next studio room getting cramps in their legs. One was six months pregnant and one of them was trying to make sure her newborn baby didn’t cry and blow their cover. They were all wondering how long the men were going to put me through my paces and my mother was becoming increasingly worried about how I might take the shock of the surprise as time went by.
A fresh batch of hysterics came up when Vid told me:
Her brother Matthew, a composer, had written and recorded the song expressly for the purposes of this practical joke and had passed the track along to Creighton as a decoy,
She knew I could be lured to the session because I’m a workaholic who has a hard time saying no to a job and that I always say yes to Creighton,
Creighton had changed the session time from 5pm to 7pm because of some kind of scheduling snafu Vid had been having with Glen the stripper,
It was Matthew himself singing on the track with a fake rasta voice. His own 3-year-old daughter had said, “is that Daddy?” when she heard it beforehand, but I, with all my voice experience, did not recognize his voice,
Who was the “bad female vocalist” whose vocals I was supposed to replace on the track? Matthew tried using Vid at first, who is a good singer. He asked her to sing badly. I heard that version later, and she did a pretty “good” job, but Matthew decided it was still recognizably Vid, so he got the receptionist from the recording studio where he works to sing it, and she was perfect,
The joke really was on me: The name of the songwriter on the lyric sheet, “Raza Kah” is actually “Ha Kazar” backwards, because Matthew’s Outer Space nickname for me has always been “Kazar”,
and
This was a complex plan that took a lot of time to execute. Everyone was in on it starting before the Christmas holidays that year: my family, my husband’s family and many of my friends and colleagues, and no one had let the cat out of the bag.
There was a secret surveillance videocamera trained on me for the whole session. They managed to hide the little red light from my eyeline. I watched the tape a few days later and found it very interesting. This tape belongs in the vault. It’s only for very selected viewing. Mostly you see me really trying hard to remain professional no matter what. If you know me, you might be able to see the signs of me almost losing my patience. The moment when the jig is up: Priceless.
After the lap dance, Glen went home and the girls took me into the kitchen at the studio, where they carved cucumbers into penises and I had to judge the best one. The male blow-up doll from my friend Karla’s own previous recent wedding shower was handed down to me. Our friend Emilie was next in line to be married, and at her shower I later handed him down to her. As far as I know, he was sent off to the Land of Retired Male Blow-Up Dolls after Bride # 3. They put a veil covered with little pink rubber penises on my head and we went to dinner.
Vid had made reservations at a restaurant in the area that is very good but also happens to be a place where a guy I briefly dated a year before I met my husband is a waiter. That was terrible grammar, sorry. I stopped seeing that guy when his so-called ex-girlfriend let herself into his apartment one morning while we were asleep, strode into the bedroom, yanked the sheet off of us while I was totally naked, shouted in an English accent: “How dare you! Where are my jeans? Those are 50-dollar jeans and you’re not worth it!” and stormed out. Very Sex And The City. Dude woke up and couldn’t understand why I said, “Goodbye. Best of luck.” I must say it was classic walking into that restaurant on this night with 15 women, holding a male blow-up doll and wearing a wedding veil covered in penises and saying, “Oh, hello, (insert Dude’s name here). How have you been? I'll have a Champagne Cocktail.”
This was one of the greatest experiences of my life, thanks to Vid who knows me too well. Everytime I hear that fabulous, ridiculous song Matthew wrote I die laughing all over again. I will put a clip of it up on my website soon for you all to hear. Meantime, here are the lyrics to the whole song, as written by the brilliant Matthew Davies.
Creighton never did come back with that water.
______________________
"This?"
Words & Music by Raza Kah
Chorus:
THIS? (You-gotta-get-up-on-to-it)
THIS? (But-don't-you-pretend-you-don't-do-it)
THIS? (You-got-to-put-your-mind-to-it)
BABY, BABY, BABY
Verse 1:
Me gotta a run tings when I'm in town
Me takin a new route ta put it back down
Me no wanna hear bout Bozo the Clown
Me steppin right up to the plate and then we put the full down
Chorus:
THIS? (You-gotta-get-up-on-to-it)
THIS? (But-don't-you-pretend-you-don't-do-it)
THIS? (You-got-to-put-your-mind-to-it)
BABY, BABY, BABY
Bridge:
You make me crazy girl
But I'm just so lazy girl
Won't you undress me girl
And show me where you'll take me
Show me where you'll take me
Chorus:
THIS? (You-gotta-get-up-on-to-it)
THIS? (But-don't-you-pretend-you-don't-do-it)
THIS? (You-got-to-put-your-mind-to-it)
BABY, BABY, BABY
Verse 2:
Me don't wanna hear about how you've been done
Me don't wanna know about all of dem ting
Me know in me heart is a burning sun
You know your body's makin a dumb speak and a poor man king
Me run tings when I'm in town
Me takin a new route ta put it back down
Me no wanna hear bout Bozo the Clown
Me steppin right up to the plate and then we put the full down
Chorus:
THIS? (You-gotta-get-up-on-to-it)
THIS? (But-don't-you-pretend-you-don't-do-it)
NOW? (You-got-to-put-your-mind-to-it)
BABY, BABY, BABY
THIS? (You-gotta-get-up-on-to-it)
HERE? (But-don't-you-pretend-you-don't-do-it)
THIS? (You-got-to-put-your-mind-to-it)
BABY, BABY, BABY
Do not turn back at the words, “wedding shower.”
There is a pay-off if you stick with me.)
Approximately this time last year I was madly preparing for my wedding and the start of my job with Sarah McLachlan which began shortly thereafter. With the timing of the tour my husband and I weren’t going to have a honeymoon unless we did something drastic.
Solution: elope to St Lucia to be married on the beach, just the two of us for one week. Return to Toronto and have a winter wedding re-enactment ceremony and huge party with our family and friends exactly one week later. This was a good plan but one that required understanding parents, a lot of planning and help from our friends.
Case in point:
I said to my best girlfriend Vid, “you might think this is weird because you know I’m not a girly-girl who has dreamed of her wedding day all her life, but I actually do think I’d like to have a wedding shower so I can hang out with all my girlfriends and my mom before I get married and go on tour.” I asked her if she would organise it. She told me she was a little surprised that I wanted a wedding shower but that she could understand my logic, and would put it together for me if I gave her all the names and numbers of the invitees. I gave her a list of about 15 women.
I didn’t hear anything about for a little while and being a bit of a control freak I checked back in with her until she said, “you asked me to do it and I’m on it. Leave it with me.” I left it with her. Shortly after that she gave me a date: an evening in January in between the elopement trip and the Toronto wedding. A bit mad but do-able. I made a note of it and continued wrapping things up: getting ready to elope, recording the last of my vocals on my 3rd solo CD, doing sessions for other people, making sure the Toronto wedding bash was coming together and learning Sarah M. songs. A busy time.
A couple of weeks before our St Lucia wedding trip I got a phone call from my friend, producer/composer Creighton Doane.
“Katy? Creighty. I know you’re going crazy but there’s a session I’d love to book you on the week after next that would take you, like 20 minutes and I could throw you a couple hundred bucks. What do ya think?”
Creighton always talks really fast. He gave me a bit of background on what the session was for. Something like the client is a producer from Montreal who needs to clean up some vocals on a track for one of his artists, he’s a friend of our mutual friend and producer Danny but Danny’s busy so Creighton’s helping him out...
...I don't know, he said it so fast I didn't really catch it but I love working with Creighton and I just figured I’d get the story straight on the day. Anyone else calling to book me on a session at that particular time and I might have said no, but I always say yes to Creighton and Danny because it’s always a guaranteed fun time. Creighton and Danny are very talented composers and studio business partners. I have worked with them a lot over the years on jingles, album backups and some side projects in our spare time.
The session was booked for 5pm two weeks hence. Creighton called me one more time closer to the day to change it to 7pm. I was home all day that day cleaning up and packing for the trip. I ran out of time to wash my hair but I managed to put it up and throw on a blazer and a little makeup to look professional for the client. I called a taxi and arrived on time.
When I got there Creighton introduced me to the client, Glen, who was a tall, handsome man with a hint of a Jamaican accent, dressed formally for the occasion in a suit and tie and behaving a little on the serious side. When I meet new clients for the first time I usually try to break the ice with them in under five minutes. In the case of this client my first move was to make a little joke about how “I was glad I wore my blazer now that I see your outfit”, referring to his suit and tie. In reality I was getting almost an uptight vibe from the guy. A bit of a tough nut to crack but I never back down from a challenge.
Creighton took us into the control room. Glen was apparently the manager of the artist who was from Montreal. He sat down and didn’t really say much. Creighton did most of the talking. He told me a woman had already sung the female part on the track but that she wasn’t very good and that they wanted me to replace her vocals. He said the artist and track was kind of like a “Shaggy”, R&B thing. He handed me the lyric sheet. It said “This”, Words & Music by Raza Kah. He played me the track.
The song started with a spacy pad, which led into an R&B groove and then a woman’s voice kept singing the word: “This”, in between lines sung by a gruff rasta voice in a patois which did remind me of Shaggy, and then the girl sang, “Baby, baby, baby” at the end of the Chorus. That was it. They said they didn’t need any female vocals on the Verses or the Bridge. I realised then that I had come all the way across town just to sing the words:
“THIS?... THIS?... THIS?
BABY, BABY, BABY”
and this struck me as funny considering how up to my neck I was in my own life at that moment, but I told myself to get a grip. I also thought, oh well, this is easy and should go quick.
The male lead vocals were in a very thick rasta dialect and I’m a nice Jewish girl from Thornhill just trying to make a buck, so I didn’t make any jokes about the “Me no wanna hear bout Bozo the Clown” line in Verse 1, which I would have done for certain if it was just myself and Creighton in the room.
The song seemed kind of goofy, but if I had a dime for every time I have had to keep a straight face while singing on tracks of questionable quality over the course of my career, welI, I’d sure have a pretty big dime collection. Yes Sir, I sure would.
The trick is to always remain professional and save certain laughs for later. The girl they already had on the track did sound pretty lame. The track was in a good key for me and it seemed fairly obvious what they were looking for: a soulful female voice interjecting with the gruff male voice on the Choruses.
I kept all of these thoughts totally to myself and said, “That sounds great. I think I know what you mean. Shall we try it?”
I went into the next room onto the recording floor. I could see them through the big glass window.
We set the levels in my headphones and I went for it. Soulful female vocals on an R&B track: comin’ right up.
I heard the pad, then the groove and I sang,
“THIS?”
(The man’s voice growled: “You-gotta-get-up-on-to-it”)
“THIS?” sang I.
(He gruffed: “But-don't-you-pretend-you-don't-do-it“)
“THIS?”
(“You-got-to-put-your-mind-to-it”, he monotoned.)
“BABY, BABY, BABY” (I offered, with soul.)
Creighton stopped the tape. In the talkback mic he said, “That was good. How did that feel?”
I said, “Good, I think. Is that the idea?”
“Yeah. Sounds great. You rock, Katy. What do you need, do you need more of anything?”
“Maybe a bit more of me but it sounds good.”
“Okay, let’s go for it. I’ll give you a little less pre-roll this time.”
“Okay cool.”
“Okay... this is how much you’ll hear and then you’re in. Four bars.”
“Okey dokey.”
“Here we go.”
He rolled track again.
“THIS?”
“THIS?”
“THIS?”
“BABY, BABY, BABY”
“Right on, that’s great. Uh, Glen is just saying maybe try it a little more, uh... here, he’ll tell ya.” Creighton told Glen to go ahead and talk to me in the talkback mic.
“Hey... that’s great. What do you think about singing it a little higher?” asked Glen.
“Uh-huh, I can do that.”
(Always be positive, especially when you think they don’t know what they’re talking about or when they might not know exactly how to ask for what they want.)
I went on, “Do you mean like, instead of the melody? Or that you might want me to stack a few parts with a high part in there?”
There was a pause in the control room while Creighton and Glen discussed it.
(FYI: the thing about the talkback mic in a session is that it is used at the jurisdiction of the engineer/producer. In other words, unless they want you to hear what is being said in the control room, you will not hear it. If I had a dime for every minute I’ve spent watching people’s lips move through the glass after a take, and wondering if (a) they have forgotten I’m still in there or (b) whether it’s possible to pass out from lack of oxygen after spending so long in a vocal booth, well, I just might need a whole other jar for all those dimes. Yes indeedy.)
“Yeah, uh, on it’s own we think,” Creighton eventually replied.
“Okay, so, like a third-up then?” I sang it in the air. “Like that?”
“Yeah try that.”
He rolled the track. I sang,
“THIS?”
“THIS?”
“THIS?”
“BABY, BABY, BABY”
a third-up from the melody. To me it sounded like a harmony missing a melody but I waited for the verdict.
After more brief (private) discussion, I heard Creighton say, “So are you good with that, Glen?”
“Can she go a bit higher?” asked Glen.
Are YOU high? I thought to myself. “Sure I can. So, like a fifth-up then? Like this?”
“THIS”, I sang, a fifth-up from the melody. Up there my voice was starting to get a little breathier. I said, “if you want it brassier I can project more, otherwise as you can hear it’s getting a little more breathy up there. Do you have a preference?”
A pause.
“Just give it a try, yeah, try it breathy.”
He rolled tape. I tried it breathy.
A slightly longer pause.
“Can you go back to the melody but up the octave, Katy? Is that too high?”
“No, I can hit that, I think.” I tried it in the air. It was the highest note so far. I could get it but it sounded like a shadowy top part you'd add to a bunch of other parts, not use on its' own. “Same concern as last time, though, just that it’s a naturally breathy note unless I belt it.”
They talked it over. “No, keep it soft. Let’s try one.”
“Okay.”
We tried one. I kept it soft. Waited for the word. Dum-de-dum-de-dum...
“Glen’s got a thought, Katy.”
“What about more like Tina Turner?” suggested Glen.
Okay. Yeah. “Okay, yeah. So, you mean bigger and brassier sounding?”
“Yeah, try that.”
We tried that. Way up that high it was sounding silly and I was feeling a bit silly.
“Yeah. Stick with the Tina Turner thing, but breathier.”
This sounded like a contradiction in terms and by now the session was starting to lose it’s “New Car Smell”. Losing My Patience was around the corner. Bridezilla was in danger of rearing her ugly veiled head. THIS? THIS? THIS? BABY, BABY, BABY? How could something so simple on something so crappy become so complicated?
Okay. Be cool. You are going to St Lucia in 2 days to get married and this session WILL be over by then. Just focus on the rules... let’s see... Right. Session Singer Rulebook, Rule # 1: Never Let Them See You Sweat.
(There are many Rules, but the rest of the Top 3:
Rule # 2: Never have bad breath.
Rule # 3: Memorize your GST Number.)
“Sure. Tina Turner but breathier. I’m actually curious to try that. Let’s see what happens.”
We rolled tape. I gave it my best shot. Sorry Tina.
Another private conference in the control room, but not before a bit of sloppy talkback-mic-muting allowed me to overhear a snippet of Glen telling Creighton, “she’s not getting it.”
Did he say SHE’S NOT GETTING IT?
“She’s not getting it?” flew out of my mouth before I could control it, but I quickly checked myself. That could have been the last straw, but like I said, I never back down from a challenge. I have polished a lot of turds, as they say, and damn it if I wasn’t going to make this one gleam.
I remained poised, or something close to it. The two men were now in deep discussion. What next? ‘Could you try it like Janis Joplin meets James Taylor?’, he asked me in my fantasy. ‘No problem you weirdo’, I replied in my fantasy. I was surprised the guy hadn’t yet said, ‘Could you sound more black?’, which is a common request I have gotten many times for many years and it still always shocks me.
Suddenly they made contact. “Glen’s gonna come in and show you what’s he's after,” said my friend Creighton. Creighton, you’re killin’ me here.
“Okay good”, said I.
Creighton opened the door and let Glen in, saying, “Do you want a water? I’ll go grab you one.” Creighton took off like a shot. Where’s the fire, I thought. Don’t be long with that water, I thought.
Glen said, “I think I know how to explain what I want. Let me show you.”
He walked over to one of the wheeled partition walls behind me. These are called “baffles”. They are used to create the effect of having a vocal booth when you are recording vocals on a larger recording floor. They localise the travel of voices in the recording session so the sound doesn’t fly around too much before making contact with the microphone.
He wheeled the wall back a bit, revealing a chair with a boombox on it. I’d worked in this studio many times before and had never seen a boombox on the recording floor. ‘That’s weird’, I thought.
He walked over to the boombox and pressed Play. The track we were working on started up. ‘That’s weird’, I thought. ‘If he wants to play me the track why didn’t they just call me into the control room where we could all hear it and talk about my part? What the hell is this boombox doing here?’
I waited for him to show me what he wanted me to do. He loosened his tie. He opened his suit jacket. He started dancing. Slow dancing. He was looking into my eyes, and he was coming right at me.
‘Holy shit’, I thought. ‘Is he trying to tell me to loosen up or something? So I’ll sing it better or something? I don’t have time for this. This is unprofessional! Oh-my-god-he’s-coming-right-at-me.’
I started laughing nervous laughter. My eyes were probably bugging out of my head. At the same time it was sort of fascinating. I thought he was like, some serious uptight dude. Now it’s like he just downed a mickey in the last 10 minutes. What gives? If he gets any closer I WILL freak right out.
He got closer. Now he was all up in my face, looking into my eyes. He took off his eyeglasses. He started slow-shimmying his suit jacket around, trying to wrap it around me. I snapped out of my shocked trance. I put my hand on his chest, pushed him back and said, “What the fuck?!”
I screamed Creighton’s name.
At that moment I saw my mother and 15 women pour out of an adjoining room.
This was my surprise Bachelorette Party, not the tame little wedding shower Vid told me we’d be having next week when I got back from St Lucia.
Turns out that when I first asked her to help me plan a wedding shower, Vid had long since been concocting her evil, delicious plan to royally fool my unsuspecting ass. She had pretended to act surprised that I wanted a wedding shower so I wouldn't suspect her of anything.
I had been Punk’d.
I fell down on the floor crying and they had to help me up.
I guess the stress of getting everything together before our two weddings and the world tour just came pouring out and wouldn’t stop, because:
I burst into tears when the appearance of my mother and all my girlfriends at such an unlikely time and place made me realize that I am a massively gullible dummy,
and
I sobbed all the way through Glen’s Oscar-worthy transformation from an uptight, suited-down bespectacled Music Industry Weazel to an absolutely gorgeous Seal-like specimen of male beauty. He was a professional exotic dancer/stripper whom Vid had hired, who proceeded to do a full strip-show/lap dance for me, right down to the G string, me crying my eyes out and laughing the whole time.
I whimpered when I realised:
That when Creighton and Glen had been talking privately to each other in the control room in between my takes, Creighton had actually been coaching Glen on what to say to me next,
and
during the session, which went on twice as long as they were told it would before they could yell Surprise, all the girls were crouched down in the next studio room getting cramps in their legs. One was six months pregnant and one of them was trying to make sure her newborn baby didn’t cry and blow their cover. They were all wondering how long the men were going to put me through my paces and my mother was becoming increasingly worried about how I might take the shock of the surprise as time went by.
A fresh batch of hysterics came up when Vid told me:
Her brother Matthew, a composer, had written and recorded the song expressly for the purposes of this practical joke and had passed the track along to Creighton as a decoy,
She knew I could be lured to the session because I’m a workaholic who has a hard time saying no to a job and that I always say yes to Creighton,
Creighton had changed the session time from 5pm to 7pm because of some kind of scheduling snafu Vid had been having with Glen the stripper,
It was Matthew himself singing on the track with a fake rasta voice. His own 3-year-old daughter had said, “is that Daddy?” when she heard it beforehand, but I, with all my voice experience, did not recognize his voice,
Who was the “bad female vocalist” whose vocals I was supposed to replace on the track? Matthew tried using Vid at first, who is a good singer. He asked her to sing badly. I heard that version later, and she did a pretty “good” job, but Matthew decided it was still recognizably Vid, so he got the receptionist from the recording studio where he works to sing it, and she was perfect,
The joke really was on me: The name of the songwriter on the lyric sheet, “Raza Kah” is actually “Ha Kazar” backwards, because Matthew’s Outer Space nickname for me has always been “Kazar”,
and
This was a complex plan that took a lot of time to execute. Everyone was in on it starting before the Christmas holidays that year: my family, my husband’s family and many of my friends and colleagues, and no one had let the cat out of the bag.
There was a secret surveillance videocamera trained on me for the whole session. They managed to hide the little red light from my eyeline. I watched the tape a few days later and found it very interesting. This tape belongs in the vault. It’s only for very selected viewing. Mostly you see me really trying hard to remain professional no matter what. If you know me, you might be able to see the signs of me almost losing my patience. The moment when the jig is up: Priceless.
After the lap dance, Glen went home and the girls took me into the kitchen at the studio, where they carved cucumbers into penises and I had to judge the best one. The male blow-up doll from my friend Karla’s own previous recent wedding shower was handed down to me. Our friend Emilie was next in line to be married, and at her shower I later handed him down to her. As far as I know, he was sent off to the Land of Retired Male Blow-Up Dolls after Bride # 3. They put a veil covered with little pink rubber penises on my head and we went to dinner.
Vid had made reservations at a restaurant in the area that is very good but also happens to be a place where a guy I briefly dated a year before I met my husband is a waiter. That was terrible grammar, sorry. I stopped seeing that guy when his so-called ex-girlfriend let herself into his apartment one morning while we were asleep, strode into the bedroom, yanked the sheet off of us while I was totally naked, shouted in an English accent: “How dare you! Where are my jeans? Those are 50-dollar jeans and you’re not worth it!” and stormed out. Very Sex And The City. Dude woke up and couldn’t understand why I said, “Goodbye. Best of luck.” I must say it was classic walking into that restaurant on this night with 15 women, holding a male blow-up doll and wearing a wedding veil covered in penises and saying, “Oh, hello, (insert Dude’s name here). How have you been? I'll have a Champagne Cocktail.”
This was one of the greatest experiences of my life, thanks to Vid who knows me too well. Everytime I hear that fabulous, ridiculous song Matthew wrote I die laughing all over again. I will put a clip of it up on my website soon for you all to hear. Meantime, here are the lyrics to the whole song, as written by the brilliant Matthew Davies.
Creighton never did come back with that water.
______________________
"This?"
Words & Music by Raza Kah
Chorus:
THIS? (You-gotta-get-up-on-to-it)
THIS? (But-don't-you-pretend-you-don't-do-it)
THIS? (You-got-to-put-your-mind-to-it)
BABY, BABY, BABY
Verse 1:
Me gotta a run tings when I'm in town
Me takin a new route ta put it back down
Me no wanna hear bout Bozo the Clown
Me steppin right up to the plate and then we put the full down
Chorus:
THIS? (You-gotta-get-up-on-to-it)
THIS? (But-don't-you-pretend-you-don't-do-it)
THIS? (You-got-to-put-your-mind-to-it)
BABY, BABY, BABY
Bridge:
You make me crazy girl
But I'm just so lazy girl
Won't you undress me girl
And show me where you'll take me
Show me where you'll take me
Chorus:
THIS? (You-gotta-get-up-on-to-it)
THIS? (But-don't-you-pretend-you-don't-do-it)
THIS? (You-got-to-put-your-mind-to-it)
BABY, BABY, BABY
Verse 2:
Me don't wanna hear about how you've been done
Me don't wanna know about all of dem ting
Me know in me heart is a burning sun
You know your body's makin a dumb speak and a poor man king
Me run tings when I'm in town
Me takin a new route ta put it back down
Me no wanna hear bout Bozo the Clown
Me steppin right up to the plate and then we put the full down
Chorus:
THIS? (You-gotta-get-up-on-to-it)
THIS? (But-don't-you-pretend-you-don't-do-it)
NOW? (You-got-to-put-your-mind-to-it)
BABY, BABY, BABY
THIS? (You-gotta-get-up-on-to-it)
HERE? (But-don't-you-pretend-you-don't-do-it)
THIS? (You-got-to-put-your-mind-to-it)
BABY, BABY, BABY
posted by Kathryn Rose (aka KR) at 10:55 a.m.
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