Kirsten Jones – Drive-In Movie

Kirsten Jones - Drive-In Movie

Kirsten Jones – Drive-In Movie (Maple Music 2005)

This album has had quite the journey. It began with heartbreak – not mine, mind you, and experienced at least one rebirth. I was introduced to Kirsten through our friend Paul Swoger-Ruston (who was also involved on this record). We had done some light recording at Jim English’s studio in Elora and then at Paul’s apartment in Toronto, but the project really began at my house with a meeting in the living room. Kirsten played us some songs on her acoustic and then we sifted through more material to fill out the list. Here, Kirsten chose Back To The Playground and Crumbs from my catalog. Both were demos done in the ska style and had to be altered greatly.

From here we prepped some guide tracks based on some references. What we didn’t realize was that we would have to re- imagine a lot of the numbers until we got it “right.” I don’t know if I want to go into those reference tracks, but let’s just say Kirsten’s tastes were broad and it would be a matter of trial and error before she planted her artistic roots. Make any sense?

We recorded the drums with Craig Lapsley in Ancaster at his cabin. With little guidance he blew through the songs in single takes marking the different sections with ease as if he’d been playing them for quite some time. After that we started the process of building the tracks. At the time, I was recording at home and there were great limitations, but with patience the songs took shape. We tried things out, for I Found You, I had Kirsten sing while lying down on the floor to push her to use more of her throat. We got to experiment with doubling/ tripling on Shadows and Lethargy. Somewhere along the line we came to a bump. Songs like Crumbs and Need You were sitting on muscular rhythm tracks and Kirsten was figuring out where she didn’t want to take the songs. I think the only reason Back To The Playground kept it’s Motown beat was due to outside opinions. So we stripped down the other two to guitar and voice, building only lightly (strings on Crumbs).

At this point, Kirsten wrote Bittersweet Grand Canyon, bringing clarity to what really got this record going in the first place. We created a version using some drum programming to build on.

Well, the process went on, chipping away until we had taken it as far as we thought it should go.

Then there’s the next phase, which is the record that most people know. Kirsten and I spoke when she secured a deal with Maple to re-release the record and decided to use this opportunity to make the album reflect who Kirsten was at that moment – or get it closer, anyway.

Bittersweet Grand Canyon – We scratched the original version, rented a pair of Neve pre-amps and a U-87 and tracked it in a day. Kirsten and I played the main guitars, percussion (tambourine skin) and Paul took the solo. Here, we capture the tone that we were looking for, both in the audio and the performance.

Shadows – Craig’s original brush kit tracks remained. The doubled vocals were blended more subtly. Paul on lapsteel bridge, Mary Simon on backing vocals.

I Found You – this would fall in the group songs wouldn’t get played live. Too muscular, too pop, but it does showcase some range. My biggest contribution would be creating the Beach Boys bridge with Paul. A fun exercise, but it came together when Kirsten made it sound “right.”

Lethargy – this is really Paul’s song. I wrote most of the second verse (lyrics), but it was only a variation on the first. Here we were able to create real atmosphere using the very light touches, ending with mellotron strings and tremolo guitar.

Need You – this would be the third version of the song. Live, it would go through more drastic changes. This was part of the Neve sessions that we did for BGC. Paul added the electric guitar. Again, this got closer to the Kirsten’s original intent. Added touches were electric organ bass, tremolo bass (faking a baritone guitar) and my best attempt at a backing vocal.

Back To The Playground – Kirsten helped restructure some of the lyrics so that it didn’t drop into that dark place that most of my songs end up going. I can hear her smile which is something I love about Kirsten, mind you, she usually makes me cry.

You Don’t Feel – the Maple release was a good opportunity to focus the mix so that the parts glued together a little more. This one features a lovely third take on the pedal steel by Steve Halloran, giving the track scope and darkness, seemingly effortless.

Might Have Been – Dave Azzolini added a loopy guitar line to the head which lifted the section. Kirsten’s layered vocals are delicious.We used the original mix for this one.

Crumbs – this is the stripped down version. This might be the original mix, too. Can’t remember. The violins were recorded at Kirsten’s apartment with Lindsey Hiiliard layering track after track. In the end, we just kept everything. She didn’t intend for us to use all the takes, but the parts connected beautifully.

So I’ll Tell You – our first try on this song was more of an atmospheric Lanois thing. In this version we peeled a bit of that away and pushed a more immediate approach. One of first songs that Kirsten ever wrote. I think.

Don’t Mind Me – this also went through some changes, but none that really altered the fact that it’s all about her vocal take. For a while this was her heart stopper at shows. She’s written quite a few more since this CD came out.

Put together on a shoe-string budget, this CD has proven to carry her all the way until now. Kirsten has more recently made an incredible record with Gary Louris (Jayhawks) and I had the honour of being a part of that, co-writing one song, playing bass and offering the occasional “mitch-a-chugga” guitar. What a pleasure.