Tales from the City: How the Album Was Made 8

The album is out and what a good sensation it is. When you work for so long on something, in my case music, and you put all your energy into it, the only thing you wish in the end is to achieve something you'll be proud of.

I can definitely say I'm proud of this record.

It's out forever, and the work we did is exactly where I wanted Mobile to be musically. We didn't reinvent music or a style, but the music is fresh and there aren't a lot of bands that sound like us in our days. Of course, you can point out certain influences but what I'm proud of is that we aren't part of any music scene.

Tales From the City is Mobile. With the first album we were trying to get a record deal, so we tried to write singles and to be part of a scene: the new 80s scene (the Killers, Franz Ferdinand, the Bravery...). You can still hear the influence from the 80s, only it's laid back and we brought new sounds and grooves from different eras. 'Slow Motion Car Crash' is a great example.

I wrote the music for this song from July 10-12, 2007 while we were on a US tour. We were in Detroit and I remember staying in a hotel in Windsor, Canada. Every night we drove back to Canada because the area we were in was very frightening. The band we were touring with got their van stolen right beside their hotel in Detroit. Because of that, we decided to go for a 10-minute drive to Windsor.

It was during these three nights that I wrote Slow Motion Car Crash. The first inspiration I got for this song was a demo I wrote a couple of years earlier. The demo was called 'Fiction of Life' and it had a nice guitar riff. I remember talking to Matt DeMatteo (producer of Tomorrow Starts Today) for this song and he said something that was about to change my whole vision of the song: 'the riff is too simple'. From then on I started thinking of the riff in a different way.

The complexity of the bass riff was worked on in the back of the van on our way to Detroit. This was where I tried different patterns and chord changes on top of a drum machine. While I was in Windsor, I spent nights and days finishing this track. Our tour manager (Boe 'Da Funky Cat') was staying with Pierre and I in our room and I remember him saying to me in the morning, 'Dude, this track seems to be awesome'. He was listening to what I was doing throughout the night. Pierre is usually dreaming when I work at night... I mean like a real baby.

Slow Motion Car Crash was written in a period where I was angry about everything surrounding me. It's the period where I got the news about my mom and our relation with our US label was going nowhere.

Everything in this track goes into distortion or an overdrive, from the drums to the vocals. A great guitar effect that I've discovered was the Line 6 Filter Pro. I created a great long filter/echo that you can hear on the track. It's very similar to a keyboard but in fact it's my Gretsch Country Gentleman through my Filter Pro, through my Korg SDD-3000 Delay and through one of my Vox amplifiers. Great sound! It's also featured on the bridge of "Mother".

Listen to a sample of this effect:

One of the key elements of this track is the bridge. It is by far my best bridge on the album. I don't remember the keyboard I was using (might be the Roland Jupiter 8) but after tweaking a few knobs here and there (mainly echoes) I came up with this Knight Rider (the TV series) sound. Five minutes later, the bridge was written. This song is so intense that when you enter the bridge it's like you can start breathing again.

Another section that I'm extremely proud of is the last chorus. I call it the Epic Chorus where you can hear a big choir synthesizer sound going into a distortion unit. It gets very intense there. I'm pretty sure that these 25 seconds might be the result of what I was feeling at the time.

Listen to a sample of this synthesizer:

When I finished the song, I was extremely proud of what I ended up with. I had never written anything like Slow Motion Car Crash in the past. It was one of the first tracks I wrote for Tales From the City and it was really inspiring for me because I knew I wrote something new and great for the band. I wanted to go further into this direction but unfortunately - or fortunately, no one will ever know - the guys in the band didn't feel as enthusiastic as I did. They thought it was too different, too much of a big change, too heavy and way too dark. It took Mat several months to understand where I was going with the music.

During the pre-production in Montreal, I can clearly remember working on a song called 'The Low Road', which became a B-Side, and once in a while I'd hear Mat in the other room screaming 'Slow Motion Car Crash..... Take Me Out of this.... Take Me Out....'. My first thoughts were.... Ooooohhhhh my God.... Wow!!!!!!! I then ran into the other room to have a full listen of what he was doing. I remember having a great feeling.

This is the kind of song, like "No Tomorrow", that makes me really proud of being a musician. Something great happened to me with this record: I started to believe in myself. Believing that great things can happen if you put in the effort. It will help me a lot for the third album. I definitely made a big step in my songwriting and the best is yet to come.

To conclude, this song is one of my favorites. Definitely not a single but a great album track and what a fucking great track to play live. You better watch your ears.

Next blog, 'Sweet Light': a dark but melodically beautiful piece of work.

See you next time,
Criq

--

Slow Motion Car Crash: listen to it on our myspace page.

---

Listen to 2 early demos I did for Slow Motion Car Crash.

'Fiction Of Life Take 1':

'Fiction Of Life Take 2 (Instrumental Version)':

---

Buy the album

---

If you are interested in listening to what influenced me for this song, download:

- Pink Floyd: Set the Controls For the Heart Of the Sun from A Saucerful of Secrets
- Gary Numan: Pleasure Principle
- Kasabian: Kasabian
- Death From Above 1979: You're a Woman, I'm a Machine