Behind The Song

“I CAN CLOSE MY EYES”

Streaming Now Here

I Can Close My Eyes was first conceptualized towards the end of the pandemic. Yes… that thing. Over the years I’ve found that I enjoy watching people and studying how they behave in different situations; I think it makes me understand myself better. During the lockdown we all felt so much stress, anxiety, and claustrophobia being cooped up for such a long time. I think it was only natural for me, as a songwriter, to wonder about the stories and lives of everyday couples. The idea came to me as a dream-like narrative, but with a devastating twist of delusion.

The concept, for me, is about denying the reality you have and not facing the truth placed in front of you. Ultimately this song is about being in love.

Once I had written the song on guitar, I worked up a demo. This was one of the first songs I wrote for FOREST and it helped inform me that the songs I would subsequently write would have a high bar musically. “I Can Close My Eyes”, has bar changes, major to minor shifts, orchestral parts and big emotional lifts. I had a pretty solid structure of keys and piano and a specific drum pattern I wrote. I guess I haven’t really mentioned before that when I do pre-production demos, there is a lot of playing, recording and programming. Firstly, I’m NOT a drummer, but I try to think like one.

Drums aside, Howard had placed breadcrumbs in my mind to keep the drums in more of a Beatles framework. He was saying “Ticket to Ride”. And I know you’re thinking “whattt???” As it’s nothing like this song. But the drum pattern is really angular and not a straight pattern at all. So that was my inspiration. We are never trying to copy, but take inspiration from a part or a song and apply it for musical depth.

I demoed up a good version to play to Howard and after a few tweaks like extending a bar here and there, I had THE demo version. Next up was working on the orchestral arrangements. Tim Lauer did an incredible job of taking this from a song that had nondescript strings to a sonic landscape that I couldn’t have imagined. It was very Dusty Springfield at its core, but the strings leaned into classic 60’s and 70’s lush moments.

Howard truly led the way with this one. I know he would say “it’s nothing without the song first”. We brought in our friend Victor Indrizzo to play drums on this one, and Mark, Todd, and Tim are back. Even when I thought we were done tracking, we went back into the studio with Sam Hunter to add some electric guitar for texture.

This might be my favourite song on the record. It moves me in a way I can’t explain. I hope you enjoy this one too.