Liner Notes

Dirt Rust & Stone

Dylan -

Dirt Rust and Stone was the first song we recorded with Louis. He told us “Let’s record all the hard stuff first, you’re not going to want to do it once you’ve already been recording for days”. Ever the wise production wizard he is, I’m glad we did, as it features the most tracks of any song on this album. 12 string guitar, heavy electric rhythm, dueling harmonica and guitar solos, and 5 layers of percussion. It was a pleasure to hear this one come together in the mixing phase.

This song also contains the only overdub not done in Moncton: a drum performance. We initially just recorded Doug’s cajon drum for this song, but as the driving force of the mix came into scope, it just felt like it was missing something…So in the spirit of those Mocton sessions, I set up a basic kit at home, much like the one we used there. I tried to mic the kit similarly, and capture a simple performance in a single take with no edits. I do wish we’d done it there, but it does serve as a good reminder that it’s okay to make adjustments as you go through the process.

“Dirt Rust and Stone” was prompted by a dream I had years ago where I was visited by my late grandmother. She was sitting at a kitchen table, watching something on a tablet, looking distressed. When I asked her what was wrong, she told me the world was changing and was confusing, and she wished she could be young to understand. I answered back “well Bubbie, I think the key to youth is to try new things. Life is a series of firsts, and as long as you have new firsts, you’ll never lose your sense of youth.” She looked at me with a smile, and I woke up with what felt like a lesson directly given to me by her. Doug is exemplary of this spirit of undying youth, and so I thought it fitting to have a 2 Shots of Hennessy song about this dream.

Depresso

Dylan -

Depresso was written one morning in 2019 at Reachside, the farm where Doug used to live. We began writing this long series of coffee puns, prompted by a fridge magnet that read “Life Without Coffee: Depresso”. It gave us the vision of someone’s life falling apart and just needing a cup of java to get through the day. And so Depresso was written in about an hour at the kitchen table…..over morning coffee.

In place of a shaker on this recording, we had the idea to record the sound of actual coffee beans we put in a Magic Bullet container, which gave us a surprisingly good tone. Probably the most unique “instrument” on the album.

We cannot talk about Depresso without noting the creative contribution of Travis Furlong’s electric blues guitar work on this track. It really elevated the song to another level. Once we had recorded a couple takes, we all sat in the control room listening back to the track and Louis asked, “Hey Travis, when’s the last time you recorded to tape?” He answered “Well, a long time ago. It must have been when I recorded my first album with my band Glamour Puss.” I piped in “...Glamour Puss? You’re the guitarist of Glamour Puss?? I have your album,”Bluesman’s Prayer” recorded in the church. I love that album!!!” It was a mind-blowing small world moment that can only happen when you put yourself in luck’s way. Another magic moment in the process of creating this album.

Dylan -

Doug -

The World is Not As Sweet

Doug -

I worked with Katharine Halder for years in the financial services industry. She was a colleague who demonstrated an inspirational energy within the organization and within the financial services marketplace. Katharine was a driving force in organizing and raising funds for various charity initiatives and participated in many corporate sports events. We collaborated on events, since I was part of a company “house band”. She would also personally bake assorted sweets every year during the United Way drive and had tasty treats and a drop box at her office where she single-handedly raised hundreds of dollars annually for this cause. I referred to this annual initiative as her “bake shop”.

Over the 2013 Christmas / holiday break Katharine entered the hospital with a heavy flu and died suddenly. It was a shock and I was reminded of a David Foster Wallace quote, “try to learn to let what is unfair teach you”. I wrote and performed this song only once at the industry-wide memorial service for her. But I kept a paper copy of the lyrics to this song in my case with other tunes I had written over the years.

This song was the biggest surprise of the album for us, as it wasn’t a song we’d planned on recording in Moncton. In fact, I’d never played it before. A few days into our sessions, I off-handedly remembered dad wrote this song, and I asked “Hey, do you have the lyrics for that song you wrote for your friend that died?” He happened to have precisely one physical copy in a songbook he carried with him. It would not be on his computer, since he wrote the song 10 years ago and performed it only once.

I asked if I could take the lyrics from him and begin reworking the song a bit to include a few more chord changes and changing just a few lines. Between recordings, I’d sit by the piano on the opposite end of the house from the recording room, work on a simple arrangement, and try to play it on piano cleanly enough to record. We worked together on the lyric chord changes and piano challenges. I’m not much of a pianist and have never recorded on one, so it was that much more intimidating recording to tape. But after a few days of intermittent practice, I felt ready to try.

We ran a total of 100 feet of XLR cables out of the recording room to capture the piano. I’m really glad we did though, because this ended up being a really special song, being so bare bones with just a piano and single vocal. Doug really delivered a great vocal performance.

Dylan -

Allman Milk

Doug -

Allman Milk started as a short harmonica riff that I created and Dylan then added guitar on top of the riff, creating a sound bite reminiscent of an Allman Brothers tune. It was not a song, but simply a “very short” idea. We thought we might create a short instrumental of this if time permitted, but it was never a priority over the other songs we were bringing to the project.

When we initially presented our 9 track titles for this project to Louis, he was immediately fixated on the Allman Milk title, despite us telling him that it wasn’t actually a song, just a riff and an undeveloped idea. But Louis loved the riff and insisted - “We’ll jam it out in the studio”, “It’ll be your favourite song on the record”, “This is how the magic gets created”, “You’ve just gotta trust me”.

It was a few days into our sessions and Louis was now insisting that Allman Milk was going to be the next song we create and record. It took us 3 days to record 2 songs and we had 6 days left to record 6 more, excluding creating a new track for Allman Milk. It felt to me like we were throwing away time by not recording songs that were actually already written. We had limited studio time and I was getting stressed out. And I couldn’t hide it any longer.

While Doug was in the studio recording lyrics, Louis’ wife, Laura, sat down with me and helped me write on two sheets of paper: a production schedule so that I could map out the work that was ahead, and a daily planner for the remaining 6 days of recording. My plan was to confront Louis and tell him why this was bothering me, explain my view and convince him to skip trying to create Allman Milk in our remaining studio time. While I did indeed confront him and we did move on, that conversation was the one time in the whole project that I felt I let Louis down. He told me to trust him, and I just couldn’t relax enough and trust his guidance enough to know things would turn out. So, Louis backed down, properly measuring my anxiety and stress and our compromise was to revisit Allman Milk later in the sessions. If I had known how good Allman Milk would turn out and how happy I’d be with it, I wouldn’t have said a damn thing. So, Louis, I really am sorry I did that. When we work together next time, you should know that I will have only made that mistake once. Our mistakes are the things we learn from and you are an extraordinary, empathetic and wise teacher.

When we finally did…well, write AND record Allman Milk, we were in the flow of things. Ideas came quickly, decisions were made without overthinking, performances were captured without much hesitation. Also to our great fortune, Louis had arranged for local young blues prodigy, Redmond Kang, to come over and record some guest guitar on the song. It was a treat having such a proficient guitar player on this track, and is a fond memory.

Dylan -

Just to See Your Smile

Doug -

As parents we experience our children grow up and go out into the world to create their own relationships and stories. And as parents we cherish those times we spend with them as adults. This is the reflective sentiment that poured from me in writing this song.

For years, the title was “Just to See You Smile”. When I recorded my vocal takes for this album, it wasn’t until we were in the control room listening back to my performance that we realized that I sang “your smile” rather than “you smile”. But it was already recorded to tape! We talked about it and realized the word “your” worked just fine here. So in that moment, the title of the song was changed, and Dylan sang “your smile” as well on his take. Again, the process created the result.

The song contains some personal memories and references:

“Birthed a living pearl” - a reference to Dylan in the womb
“The grass has all grown long now, there are blackbirds in the pear tree” - references to Reachside - our place in Prince Edward County where I crafted many songs
“Ritual for Mother’s Day and wept” - a truly emotional evening ritual we shared honouring the many mothers in our families and in the world and of the world
“I love the old magnolia” is a reference to Dylan’s song “Oh, Magnolia” from 2015
“Mustang Sally still can ride” a self-reference - you are never too old to ride
“Raise a glass for 2 Shots of Hennessy”, we implore you to do this if you ever see us perform this live

Life Will Be Better

I have played a bit of harmonica over the years and have adopted this song as a cathartic release from a marriage that just did not work out. Ever since I saw Sugar Ray Norica perform this song live, it has become one of my favorites. Over the years of performing this with Dylan, it’s become a setlist staple of ours. When it came time to pick a couple of covers to record for the record, this was a natural fit with the bluesy feel, harmonica interludes, and the way it fits into the overall album. It was taken up another level also, by us having the pleasure to feature Redmond Kang on electric rhythm guitar. Thanks again Redmond!

Doug -

Blessing in Disguise

Doug -

This song was organically created when a planned rehearsal morphed into a songwriting session. Dylan had booked a rehearsal studio for us, since we had a gig that evening. While Dylan was getting a tour of the new facility by his friend and manager of the space, I began to set up in our room and was playing my cajon to a beat that I just made up while I waited for his return. I was kind of scat singing to this beat when Dylan walked in and he said, “Keep that going”. He got his guitar out, tuned it and built a melody on the spot over what I was playing. “I love that beat, let’s write a song” he said.

So we decided to each craft a verse to something in each of our lives that was difficult, but turned out to be a blessing in disguise. We finished the song by the end of the session, packed up without rehearsing and headed down to our gig where we performed the song to a live audience that evening from our respective scribbled notes we each made in “rehearsal”. I have come a long way since I started playing music with Dylan.

What a Wonderful World

Dylan -

The last track on the album has deep meaning for both Dylan and for me - for different reasons. For me, this was my Mother’s favourite tune. It brings her to the forefront of my mind every time I sing it….and I have sung this song many, many times. This was our last recorded track in our studio sessions and because we had such limited space remaining on our recording tape, some minor timing adjustments were made to get the full track recorded onto the remaining tape. For that reason Dylan was to stand in the recording booth in front of me while I sang to his “hand-signal-help” and ensure I hit the new sequences of this version…. not to be confused with the way I had performed this hundreds of times - the other way.

With headphones on, deep breaths to relax, Louis in the control room came through my headphones “You ready Doug?”. Just as I am about to confirm, I look up at Dylan and think of how proud my Mom would be to see us right now, performing this song together. The emotional presence was overwhelming. Looking into Dylan’s eyes, tears welled up and ran down my face. “Hold on Louis”. Dylan stepped up and hugged me while that wave of emotion washed over me. Then, I laid that vocal track down.

Doug -

Sailor's Glory

Doug -

I have raced sailboats since I was a teenager (over 45 years). I learned to race on Lake St. Clair, crewing for close to a decade with Jim Powell on his 24 foot Crescent sailboat. The annual week long regatta at Put-in-Bay, Ohio was a summer highlight that we had won many times over the years. Life moved on. I moved to Toronto and Jim continued his winning ways. He taught me so much about sailing, racing, how to compete, how to win with humility, how to care for your boat, your crew, yourself.

I had not seen Jim in several years. My brother called me one Saturday evening and announced that Jim had died of a massive heart attack while crossing the finish line in a sailboat race that afternoon…A race that he won. At Jim’s funeral his two boys approached me and requested that I take them and my brother to Put-in-Bay that summer and race Jim’s boat in his memory.

That regatta came down to the last tack on the last leg of the last race. We got ahead of our closest competitor and stayed there to finish the race and win the regatta. It was a very emotional acceptance on the lawn of the yacht club later that afternoon. I have won North American Championships and sailed World Championships. I have learned from Olympic sailors and class champions…But no win was sweeter than that victory at Put-in-Bay.

Jim taught me the greatest lesson - a sailor’s glory comes from within.