Learn your body's signs — and don't ignore them

Here’s an admission: when an emotional song that I’m working on is really working, I will well up in my chest. Almost break out in tears. Sometimes I literally tear up.

Also, I’ve learned over the years that this is a fairly accurate proxy for how well the song will connect with people out in the world once it’s released. So it’s important that I be in touch with this feeling!

Also also: sometimes something I’m working on will be doing this, and then it won’t any more. So then I have to ask myself, is it simply because I’ve gotten used to the song? It’s not going to make me cry indefinitely.

So then I have to wait until some time has passed, and listen again with fresh ears. Do I have an emotional reaction?

This happened to me with our new 80s kids song (out this Friday!). On the first night of working on the mix, at a certain point I hit play and I listened to it all the way through and I choked up. Great news!

But: the vocal was a bit crispy. I was using a Distressor-type compressor on it, and the harmonic information that it was imparting was over the line for this song.

So I kept working on the vocal — this is the one that I ended up spending twelve hours finding a compressor for. And I worked on the music here and there along the way, refining details bit by bit as I got to know them better.

And, by the end of the process, I had a mix that we loved — and also I was no longer having an emotional reaction to it. Hm! But that potentially made sense; my ears were fried. We waited a day, listened, still liked it, and I didn’t have an emotional reaction — but we decided it was fine to upload to the distributor.

And then there’s a waiting period! We always give it like three weeks between uploading and release day — that gives us enough time to submit to playlists etc. So there’s sort of a built-in cooling-off period. And I used it purposefully, to not listen to this song. To really get some distance from it.

And I opened it up yesterday — and I’m still not quite having the emotional reaction that I remember having! It’s close. I can feel it wanting to happen. But something’s blocking it.

So, today, three days before release day, I’m back in the mix, and I’m going to see if I can figure it out. Because I know my body, and I have an idea what this song can do, and I don’t think it’s quite doing it 100% yet.

Never stop — jamie