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Music

Song: “Two Weeks to Live” (Feat. many guests!)

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Last year, I started thinking about how I am surrounded by absolutely incredible, world-class musicians, and what an idiot I am not to invite them to play. I realized I would love to have an excuse to ask them to play on one of my songs. So I wrote an 80s hard rock/metal song around a melodramatic tale of the supernatural, primarily because I thought several people might have fun showing off through it. The solos from Leila-Abdul Rauf, Ry Kihn, Audrey Shida and Brian Poedy were all recorded independently, and I told them to play for as long as they liked. I just sort of hoped they’d all fit together in the final mix, and they did. I then had to try to improve the rest of the song to get on their level.

To top it all off, I clearly do not have a metal singing voice, but Audrey’s sister Kate regularly performs an epic death growl, so I asked her to be the Voice From Out Of The Black. I deployed her power judiciously, but she has some of the biggest impact on the song.

Unlike a lot of other more cryptic songs in Hero Falls, this one is a pretty straight up origin story, where I just laid everything out in the lyrics.

“Two Weeks to Live”
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Music

Song: “Happy Family” (Feat. Blythe Renay)

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First, I hate children.

Second, I wanted to work with Blythe Renay since the earliest days of this project. I’d actually asked her to take a crack at “Another Hero Falls” first, but I wound up going with Moorea’s take. But at that point, I realized, okay, I need to write a song specifically for Blythe. Something that matches her voice, her delivery, her ability to be sweet and nasty at the same time. Little did I know she would be immortalized as GenIVIV in Borderlands 3 shortly thereafter — now she’s gamer famous! But she agreed to work with me anyway, and for that I am extremely grateful. She’s kinda one of my favorite people in the world.

The result is a story of a Karen. I started thinking, as I often do, about kidnappings, and if there was a case where someone would do that from a position of mercy. Like, Karen here is selfish — she wants a kid, her henpecked husband has issues delivering the payload, and she’s looking for other ways to grow their family. But then she looks around at all these parents who seem to hate their kids — ignoring them, neglecting them, just looking exhausted and like they realize they have made a terrible mistake that wrecked their lives. So…why not solve both problems at the same time? Frank’s work at the Epicenter gave him access to mind-wipe device from a canceled project, so, you know…what you don’t remember can’t hurt you. Just rearrange the pieces on the game board and everybody wins. That’s Karen logic for you.

“Happy Family” (feat. Blythe Renay)
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Song: “Another Hero Falls” (Dan’s Demo)

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I am honored and thrilled that Moorea Dickason agreed to sing the final version of this track, but I lived with my guide vocal for so long that I kind of grew to like it. I also wrote the song in a different key, so I wound up rerecording everything for the final version. That makes the demo something of a relic.

So, since I’ve been battling some tech issues and could not finish the current track in progress before the end of the month, I thought hearing how the song evolved between demo and final would of mild interest — and it would at least cover the July release!

“Another Hero Falls” (Dan’s Demo)
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Music

Song: “The Dinner Party”

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It’s about time we got to meet the main villain in Hero Falls. The Crime Minister has been running the underworld and more since 1973. This song explains how he came to power. Bon appétit!

I am incredibly grateful to have Jackie Perez Gratz and Travis Kindred both appear on this track, contributing cello and bass, respectively. The addition of real strings is not something I expected, but it totally made me believe in the track more once I had them. Jude Kelley was, as always, super helpful with the organ parts; he not only played the Mellotron choir voices but he suggested them as an addition to what I had.

Also, it’s not clear in the song, but The Crime Minister has a very distinctive real name — Talmadge Garvin Blevins — so a sincere thank you to the real Tal for letting me use his name for such a murderous scoundrel!

“The Dinner Party”
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Music

Song: “How Does This Work”

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I grew up with two parents.
I feel fortunate for that, as a lot of my friends didn’t. Everybody deals with something like that in a different way.

Kelly Argyle grew up knowing her dad existed, but not really knowing him — he was always working, gone for long periods of time, never seeming to have time to spend with her. That kind of resentment builds up, but her mom was always making apologies.

When her dad died during her freshman year of college, she learned the surprising truth: Her father was Wyldchild, a cosmic superhero who’d been killed in a battle in another galaxy. She’d never really known him, and now she never would. Kelly wasn’t sure whether she should be sad or angry.

But when a glowing gold bracelet comes hurtling in from space, attaches itself to her wrist, and goes dark…well, then she knew which emotion to feel, and she questions both the presumptive motives of her father and the alien artifact that she cannot seem to remove.

More happens after the song, of course, and she starts to make sense of it all with a little help from someone special. But we’ll leave that for another time.

Of special note for this angry, angsty riot grrrlly track: F-bombs fly in the lyrics, so if you prefer a clean/radio edit, I made one available for free on Bandcamp. I know some of you listen with kids in the car so I wanted to give you the option….but if you go clean, you’ll miss a bit of vulgar wordplay of which I’m proud. 🙂

When I got to know Stephanie Dowling as a co-worker, I really enjoyed her company and energy. When I found out she also fronted a cover band in Los Angeles and sang a song in Fallout: New Vegas, I thought, well, I gotta work with her. She came over to my house and recorded the vocals live, soaking up any and all direction I gave her, and I’m very grateful she was so dedicated to making this character snarl and bark and sneer.

Also thanks to the real Kelly Argyle for letting me hijack her name!

“How Does This Work”
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Music

Song: “Bad Scientist”

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The road to jail is paved with bad inventions. Poor Jeff Hammond dreamed of being a superhero, and he became one, if you consider high-school science teachers heroes (and I do). But he wanted to help fight the never-ending war on crime in a more tangible way, so he used his big ol’ science brain to invent gadgets for the heroes to use. But staying an anonymous donor backfired once the technology itself backfired — with disastrous results. And now that he’s the target of a manhunt, he just wants the officials combing the city to know that they’ve got this all wrong…

I don’t remember exactly where the idea for this came from, but it became an excuse to indulge my black sense of humor. I really liked the sympathetic character, trying to do good but just not having the skills necessarily to pull it off. The idea of a gadget-maker who wound up being seen as a serial bomber — or serial killer — stuck with me. In the earliest concept he killed all the heroes he tried to help, which made him a huge target for other heroes, but as I wrote the lyrics, I realized it was better with a lower death toll. Most of his screw-ups have been injuries, but…alas, poor Epitome, I knew her well.

I am very happy that I was able to collaborate with Jude Kelley, my bandmate in Palette-Swap Ninja, for the solo on this track. I’ve been enjoying at least trying to play all the instruments myself, but when I pitched the idea of an organ solo to Jude, he almost immediately sent back the scorching B3 run you hear in this track. I immediately felt it elevated what I had, so I said “Great, that’s it” and added a few more keys to the mix so it wouldn’t come out of nowhere. Jude makes everything better.

“The Sky”
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Music

Song: “The Sky”

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I can’t write love songs. I’ve tried. This is as close as I get.

I wound up getting really invested in this, and I’ve written a lot of backstory. Cirrus and Stratus got their powers together, while they were married — something I haven’t seen a lot of in comics. They can fly, but they aren’t terribly powerful; they work as reserves and scouts for the bigger heroes. Stratus felt a lot of civic duty, and Cirrus sort of went along with it, but then Stratus died after being struck by lightning in 2007. Five years later, Cirrus is visiting his grave, still coping with the loss as best she can. If she can’t move on, she’s going to at least keep going.

There’s more to her story. She’s interesting.

Fate put Kimzey McGrath and I together in an 80s cover band and I found my singing soulmate. I am so happy with the vulnerability she shows here; it’s sweet, it’s wistful, it’s remembering the good things when you’ve lost a loved one. It’s how I would want to be remembered.

“The Sky”
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Music

Song: “Your Own Devices”

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They say you should write what you know. Every day on my commute, I am mildly inconvenienced by people who are lost in their personal technology — folks who text while walking, while biking, while driving. It’s one thing to interact while you’re sitting or standing on public transit, but every day I see people cannot put their phone down long enough to walk up or down a flight of stairs. They slow down, engrossed, oblivious to the people they are blocking behind them. It’s an epidemic in San Francisco, anyway.

I started thinking about someone for whom this is not a mild inconvenience. Emery Sylvain understands technology but, in 2015, loses his link to humanity after he loses his daughter to a distracted driver. Society’s obsession with their phones has gone too far — and he’s going to roll it all back.

“Your Own Devices”
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Music

Song: “Another Hero Falls”

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Back in 2008 I read Austin Grossman’s Soon I Will Be Invincible. That sparked an idea for a duet between a frustrated villain and a disillusioned hero, each preparing to compromise their values to become successful in their fields. Problem was, I was not a songwriter, and I doubted I could become one. I tried anyway, but it went nowhere. I revisited the idea when the context of Hero Falls suggested itself, and I still liked the idea of an unappreciated female hero turning villain because she was smarter and more capable than the bad guys she was catching. I focused on that and fleshed out Fyrefox as a character. And now, it’s the namesake track.

I feel amazingly fortunate that Moorea Dickason agreed to sing this. I’d met her through Brian Adam McCune when we needed a vocalist for the 5th anniversary Rocksmith concert. I got to sing with Moorea that night and I was blown away by her power and energy. When I reached out to see if she’d be interested in singing something for HF, she chose this song, and I’m very glad she did.

I know what led Fyrefox to this decision and I hope I get to share that story someday. I also know what happens to Fyrefox next but I’m not going to tell you.

“Another Hero Falls”
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Music

Song: “Give It Up For Me”

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Imagine being the most powerful superhero in town. You can fly, you can shoot lasers out of your eyes, you can move very quickly. People really love you. You start to love you too. Then, people start to outright worship you…and you go along with it. Imagine doing all the right things for all the wrong reasons.

Truth is, I always found Superman boring, but I really enjoy what-if comic stories like Irredeemable and Injustice. They imagine their primary hero turning against humanity, using his powers for destruction and totalitarianism. Silver Savior is just into himself; he’d rather be loved than feared. He knows he’s the center of attention; everyone’s praise just feeds his messiah complex. To me, he’s Superman crossed with David Lee Roth, with a side of sacrilege. If he sees himself as a party, what better soundtrack in his head than ska?

This song would not sound the way it does without the incredible last-minute help from several friends. A few days before the song’s release, I realized I needed more crowd voices — many more. So I put out a call on social media, and a few hours later I had contributions from more than a dozen people, each singing their choice of harmonies. I am forever indebted to them making this song come to life:

Katrin Auch
Susan Esther Barnes
Stephanie Dowling
ElaraSophia
Jude Kelley
Nat Loh
Kimzey McGrath
Tim Porter
Sean Redman
Blythe Renay
David W. Ryan
Deirdre Martin Ryan
Erik Smith
Hannah Wolf

“Another Hero Falls”
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