Episode 2 - Afghanistan

The Seed

Its hard to write something that's truly contemporary. It takes time to reflect on a thing from a position that isn't just reactionary and have a perspective that's worth sharing. And after the writing, you have to execute the thing - so record it, edit it, send it out into the world - it's a big ask, and it's rarely done well. The song "Ohio" by Neil Young (and recorded by CSNY) is one of the few examples I can think of. It was rush-released 10 days after the Kent State shootings. Apparently Neil saw a picture in Life magazine, happened to be with the rest of the band, and they wrote and recorded the song within a matter of days.

But ideas aren't always improved by thorough analysis. Brian Eno's Oblique Strategies has a card to "Honor thy error as a hidden intention" - which is one of the things I like about Hoursongs. The hour-long canvas forces you to find expedient solutions to problems - it forces you to accept, adapt, and ultimately to lean into the errors.

I listened to the news of the fall of Kabul almost in a fugue state. Decades of history, billions of dollars, were unwound in a matter of days. The New York Times' "Daily" podcast interviewed somebody who was trying to determine how long it would be before the capitol fell. The dread was just so present in her voice. As a woman, she feared for the world she and her family would be vaulted into when the takeover happened. In her voice I heard - inevitability, frustration, terror.

Then I watched a GIF of the C-130 maneuvering down the Afghan runway loop again and again. People hanging onto the landing gear falling like dolls when the plane took off. That's the gesture of the song. That's what I knew I wanted to write about.

The Arrangement / What Would I Change?

I'd love to make a piece of music that was equal parts music, storytelling, and journalism. That's kind of where I started here. I took a few fundamental parts - rhythm, atmosphere - and used verité samples to create a bed.

I started with a simple bass pulse and layered some sounds of marching deep under, triggered off the bass drum. I layered in a news recording of the Taliban taking over a weapons depot. Played around with the reverb send to give the song a little more space.

I continue to use formant filters on background vocals, but here I applied it a little differently than I did in the first hour-song "Las Vegas". With this one, I applied a hard auto-tune, and then a formant onto of it, which created this digital chipmunk thing that's really interesting. I liked the way that sat against the background - it created this interesting tension that felt cut from the same cloth as the backdrop.

So - what I would Change

• I had an additional verse written that tried to pull a link between the people who rioted at the Capitol on January 6th and the Taliban. There is, at least at this point, daylight between the doctrines of the two groups. The 3 Percenters, or Oathkeepers, or whoever don't as a matter of course set off IEDs in the street. Tying them together seems like a cheap shot (for now). I reserve the right to change that in the future.