Recording - February 2010 - 45

Continued from page 43 we had a finger-picking exercise and I always played with a pick. I couldn’t finger-pick, my dexterity wasn’t that great and I failed the test because I used a pick. And my mom is like, “You failed a guitar class?” [laughter] Guess you showed her. And you know what, you guys? How long ago was that, 20, 30 years ago? Lord have mercy; we’re gettin’ old, man. So 30 years later I’ve had about 25, 30, 40 songs that have been hit songs that have that finger-picking thing that I did with my pick. The very thing I was doing wrong has become my thing…for me. You’re the master of like four-syllable hooks— “What Hurts the Most,”“This Is My Town,”“These Days,”“My Wish.” Did you have to teach yourself to take a complex thought and squish it down and figure out what the essence of the thought was, and then which words describe that essence, and then make it lyrical? Or is it something that just came naturally just by doing it all the time? I mean, yeah. I did have to learn that, but a lot of it… That’s a hard question to answer. It’s a lot of everything. It’s weird when someone asks you something when I don’t really think about it, you know? That’s the innate-talent part. And that’s probably the deal, too. You don’t over think it too much. But I look for it. I look for the pockets and the windows and the doors in the music, you know what I mean? To me, it’s in the music. To me, the music opens that door. Can I tell a really fast little story? You can tell a long one. Go for it. I wrote “What Hurts the Most” with Steve Robson, who lives in London. I had written “These Days” with Danny Wells and Steve, and I’d never met Steve. It was just kind of a thing that they sent to me to write the lyric to the track, which I’d never done before. I’d never just written a lyric to somebody’s music before. Then we had this big #1 hit, and I’d never even met Steve, but they sent me over there to write with Steve, and I was really intrigued by writing a lyric to somebody’s music, because usually I’m playing—doing my thing playing piano or whatever. But when I got there, he had the track of what was gonna be “What Hurts the Most” already laid out. And I kept listening to the track, and I was just sitting there listening to it, really getting into it. It was really just great. And I said, “God, this is so good. What is this song about?” You know, I’m just thinkin’, and all my thoughts and life and stuff are going through my head. Then what happened was—it was a light-bulb moment for me—there was a part in it in the channel [he sings the part], it kept repeating that, and I latched on to that. And opposed to starting with the first verse, or having a line that I wrote down for the chorus, I had nothing. But that music, the way it was bouncing. I’m sittin’ there listening to it, and I start going, [he sings] “Afraid to cry, every once in a while, even though, going on….” And to me it was just mumbo-jumbo. I wasn’t trying to write a lyric, I was just trying to get a pattern with what he was playing. Then I looked at it and I went, “Hey, that’s all right.” [laughter] It occasionally rhymes, you know? And then it went back to the verse and I started writing the verse. So the channel was like the first thing I wrote. Then when I got to the chorus, I had basically written the chorus, and the title was “What Means the Most.” That was kind of the title. And I went and sang the vocal. This is the crazy way a song keeps evolving. You can’t ever say that it’s over. That’s why it’s so hard for us to let go. But he made the whole track up, so I had nothing to do with the music. I was just writing the melody and the lyric. But the whole time I was there I was just noodling around with my guitar playing a little lick [he sings] because I’m bored. And he’s like, “Man, you’ve been playing that lick all day. What is it?” I said, “I don’t know. Just playing into the first chord on your track.” And he goes, “Well, let’s put it on the track,” and it became the hook. Stupid stuff. It’s stupid stuff. This is a stupid gig when you think about it. How did we get this gig? And they pay us for it! [laughter] I mean really, it’s crazy. But I think you have to open yourself up to that stuff, you know what I mean? You really do. Don’t miss Part Two in next month’s issue!

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Recording - February 2010

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