“Antidote” music video

With my Finding the Light album release this week, I figured I should preview a full track. And in the same spirit as the recording process, why not keep the video DIY, too?

Trivia:

• Self-shot with a single GoPro on a gooseneck clamp in my Womb With a View studio.

• This was the penultimate song written and recorded. Given the theme of the album, I needed a climactic, scorching “set-closer” of sorts before the metaphorical encores.

• There was supposed to be a double-time section that really smoked (third verse), but in the moment I simply forgot to record it!

• I program all of my drum tracks one measure at a time, which is why there’s no kit in the studio (that, and I wouldn’t be able to actually execute it).

• The lyrics employ a method called polysemy, where each instance of the word antidote has a slightly different meaning in context.

• Probably the best bass line I’ve written to date, though my blistered fingers might disagree.

• On guitar, I’m using a “hybrid” picking technique (pick + fingers) that makes those triplets in the verse much easier to play in time and with the proper accents.

• That device I’m holding over the guitar pickup during the solos is called an EBow. It replaces the pick, and a battery creates a magnetic field that vibrates the string for infinite sustain. You can also achieve cello-like volume swells by moving it closer to or farther from the pickup. This song was the first time I’d ever used one, and you can hear it throughout the opening overture track, called “Zeitgeber.”

• Final Cut Pro (video editing software) has a “multicam” mode that was a huge timesaver in synchronizing all those clips to the audio track.