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SKY / OCEAN

This is "Sky / Ocean", the fourth track of Thank You George's song writing and production project "The World is Mine". Please follow its ongoing evolution on this website.

About

First recorded in August 2016 on Olkhon Island, Russia

I was on a bus in Georgia when I realized that I had just started traveling. Before that day it felt like being on vacation. An extended vacation, sure. But then again I had been backpacking for comparable amounts of time in the past. In the months before I had walked through Iran and Azerbaijan with my mind expecting to go back home to my previous routine and we'll-known terrain. It took me almost two months to process the thought that I would be on the road and outside my comfort zone for an undefined period of time.

Learning what being a long-term traveler actually means played a major part in this realization. You enter a parallel universe that exists outside of the world you are traveling to see. With the people and their everyday lives and their jobs and their hopes and their dreams and their fears. You stop existing in this reality. You might be visiting the people there from time to time. But you will never stay long. And since you develop your own routine, your own needs, your own way of doing things, you become a stranger to the real world. At the same time you stop building towards something. You stop functioning for other people. You stop being in control. And the more you let go, the better your experiences will be.

The bus got stuck in a traffic jam and so I got out my notebook and started writing about this parallel sphere that I am still living in today. This is how the lyrics for "Sky / Ocean" came to be. It's a song about being a traveler. About the forces that are surrounding you, that are pushing you, pulling you, that are moving you, guiding you. And it's a song about growing closer to and embracing those who are sharing these experiences with you.

Over the next few weeks I edited the lyrics so they would fit to a guitar theme that I had come up with a few months earlier. I even remember briefly pplaying it at a rehearsal with Thank You George (somehow we didn't manage to turn it into a full-grown song back then). Now I used said theme for the verse and added the chords for the chorus and the C-part. Originally I played most of the song in the fingerpicking style that I like so much (you can hear the remains of that original version in the last verse of the song). Then I thought of the other songs and decided to plan "Sky / Ocean" as a full-grown band song. Therefore you might find that the song doesn't sound finished with only the guitar and vocals in it. I am really looking forward to Ali and Jan's contribution on this one!

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EVOLUTION

From Song writing to arrangement to production

June 2017: The World Is Mine - An EP In Progress

About this version

After an intense exchange of ideas in our band chat we finally managed to bring 'Sky / Ocean' to life as a full-grown band version. Went went through more than eight layouts before we arrived at this result. In the process we mostly focussed on adding another twist to the song. So Ali and Jan tried some things and finally came up with the idea to slice up the first part of the second verse and play breaks in between shorter chunks of music. After that it took some time to define the detailed arrangement including the length of each chunk, the intensity of the instrumentals and the overall length of the part.

Listening to it now I think that 'Sky / Ocean' is the best work brought to life in the course of this project. It certainly is the most sophisticated and thought-out track with all things falling into place: from its harmonies and lyrics to the song's instrumentation, its arrangement, its sound layout. I imagine that the current version will even survive the process of re-thinking the project's material at a later point in time.

The recording of the drum and bass lines happened during a session with Kiezkojote's Toby Lelushko some time in the spring. He met with Ali and Jan in our rehearsal room in Hamburg and made sure that we had at least halfway decent recordings to add to our final mix. Still, with the little time the guys had on their hands they only managed to provide quick-and-dirty recordings. Which is one of the main reasons why, despite the pretty reasonable outcome, we decided to call this release "An EP In Progress" and have another go at the material when I get back to Hamburg.

Change log

  • Adding live drums (recorded with a set of stereo microphones)
  • Adding a live bass (recorded via line-in)
  • Mixing the track
  • Mastering the track (curtesy of Kiezkojote's Toby Lelushko)

November 2016: The Bangkok Sessions

About this version

In early November I stayed in Bangkok for ten days. I decided to use that time to review all the material I had created in the course of this song writing and recording project. To get it in order and to properly prepare it, maybe even for a first release with my band Thank You George in early 2017.

Through my Thai-friend Tui I found a rehearsal room at this cultural centre called Brownstone. I spent a few days there to properly re-record and mix the songs the project "The World Is Mine" had brought to life up until that point.

I didn't make too many changes to most of the songs. When listening to "Sky / Ocean" you will find that I left the overall structure almost intact. I did however rework the instrumentation and the arrangement: I added our band's signature sound scapes and two lines recorded with an electric guitar (an old Telecaster I found at Brownstone studio which, on the second day, only had 5 strings). One of these lines works as the support guitar and almost plays throughout the entire track; the other one is a rhythm line mostly contributing to the overall sound.

Change log

  • Properly re-recording the lead acoustic guitar and the lead vocals
  • Recording the support electric guitar (which is creating most of the sound scapes you hear in this version)
  • Recording the rhythm electric guitar
  • Getting rid of the doubled and panned guitars as they were cluttering up the song's mix
  • Reworking the Ableton Live Setup to clean up the sound effects

September 2016: The essentials

About this version

When staying on Olkhon Island in the middle of Russia's Baikal Lake I recorded the fragments (the chord-successions of the verse and the chorus) and then moved them around to eventually find a fit with the lyrics. Then, when staying in Bal, Indonesia, I recorded the acoustic guitar and vocals for "Sky / Ocean" and made a quick mixdown. This is what the song sounds like when dialed down to its essentials.

Change log

  • Recording the lead acoustic guitar
  • Recording the lead vocals
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Lyrics

The sky is in the ocean
And the ocean's is in the sky
And in between there are floating
The fragments of our lives
And In between a vacuum
With the both of us inside

Shield off your eyes
And don't look back
Seal shut your mind
And don't look back

With our faces under water
Our arms spread open wide
We let go of the doubts
And the control over our lives
We let go of our thoughts
Until we think alike

Shield off your eyes
And don't look back
Seal shut your mind
And don't look back

Shield off your eyes
And don't look back
Seal shut your mind
And don't look back

The current in our bodies
And the current in the sea
Align as we grow closer
Steered by waves and breeze
When I talk about tomorrow
I'm saying you and me