A full day of production work on American Lawyer and Excessive Consumption, with vocals and guitar parts for both. American Lawyer is finished I think. It's a very strange song, I'm not sure if I love it or hate it, but consider that sentiment a good thing. I can't like every track equally, and should not aim to do so. Ultimate creativity necessitates a wide gamut, and growth can only occur by charging into new and unexpected areas. Sometimes disliked or odd artworks can be bridges to new and beautiful things that nobody has thought of or explored before.
The verses are fixed in E-minor with staccato organ chords, very flat and electric. The bass line shudders as though it were written for a troupe of zombie dancers. The chorus grows in alarming semitone climbs, remaining minor, and the words are barely melodic, more like a chant. An angst-ridden guitar solo breaks scales all over the place. The song is blues for electronics.
The sequence was started in 2020, and was pretty much written then, so it's taken 4 years to finish, almost all completed in the last 48 hours.
The overall effect reminds me of two of my older tunes: the skeleton dance from Burn of God, which I always liked due to the emotion in the vocals and guitar; and the theme to my old game Antz, due to the heavy vibrato. I didn't really like that tune, but that too was a deliberate push to something different in my game music of that period. For Antz I wrote a tuneful alternative but rejected it for not being exciting or different enough.
Here are the words to American Lawyer:
American lawyer
With your fancy suitcase
American lawyer
With your fancy words
American lawyer
With your super-slick hair
American lawyer
With your super-slick mind
Are you gonna save my skin?
I hear that the richest guy wins?
Are you gonna nail my case?
I hear that you're the best
human in the human race
Dance with me
American lawyer
Are you gonna make my day?
Make the jury weep and say
"Praise the lord!" and "Praise the law!"
Will you make crime pay?
American lawyer
