This one was all pretty improv and a little more experimental than usual for the process. I started by coming up with the music on my electric piano with no particular song in mind, just keeping it simple and recording it onto my phone for a quick low tech approach but only had a title and 2 or 3 lines of lyrics after a few tries and not coordinated enough to play piano and sing. I just recorded the piano part on my phone, then dumped it into Pro Tools.

I recently got a simple 2-channnel interface and got confused with the I/O setup so that set me back on time. Eventually I got it working and added a drum machine, even though the piano was done without a click track so it was off a bit but weirdly close enough so I went with it. Then I added an acoustic guitar and a track of ambient background vocals with no words which I duplicated to make another track to play around with.

Then I spent most of the time just singing and writing lyrics. The chord structure wasn't very consistent so I just wrote lyrics to fit until I charted the whole thing out. As soon as I sang it all the way through I called it good then double tracked the vocal in one take so it's not very tight but felt good enough for what this was. I really enjoyed working that way, can't say I have done it the way before and I was very open to whatever words popped up, as ridiculous as they were it was a lot of fun. Just stream of consciousness stuff with debatable redeeming qualities. Then since the drum machine wasn't quite on I just really messed round with effects and kept it low in the mix.

Said the leader of our nation
lighten up and have some fun
so I went down to the Walmart
and bought myself a gun
then I snorted angel dust
and robbed a Cinnabon

Went down to my haberdasher
who looked just like that cute Jane Asher
she was the the living end
she used to be Paul’s girlfriend

I asked for 500 bright red hats
like Bartholomew Cubbins
took some fentanol
and got stoned down to the nubbins
bought some sharper image steaks
and applied some Cajun rubbins
put on my invisible zoot suit
and did some night clubbin

Went down to the drainage ditch
and shot some sewer rats
loosened up my pantaloons
and voted democrat
swallowed more fentanal
and dreamt about a border wall

And then I really lightened up
yeah I really loosened up
I take advice from billionaires
with pimento eyes and straw bale hair

I woke up in a halfway house
like an embryonic Mickey mouse
I was lit up like a Christmas tree
in Clark Griswold’s wildest fantasy
Beverly D’Angelo was in a see-through blouse
she was built like a brick firehouse
I was finally lightened up
like a porn star without a prenup
I was finally lightened up
oh thank you oh thank you
oh thank you oh thank you
oh thank you oh thank you

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• 

  @ericdistad  Feb 21

  This is such a fun and clever psycadelic lyric - I love the rhyme and rhythm structure. The organ/guitar combo is really cool. (I may have to try that at some point)
  
  This was a trip, man! I dig it!

• 

  @majordanby  Feb 18

  Pshycedelic gold. Brilliant lyric and delivery. It’s not easy to pull off this genre without it sounding a little rubbish. You have created a great pshycedelic number. Hats off.

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  @toddnorem  Feb 14

  Damn, this is straight up psychedelia in the best way. It's like a heavy dose of Syd Barrett as his mind started to fry and then you turn off your mind relax and float downstream into the futuristic nightmare of the distant world of 2019. Are maybe it's still 1967. Oh wait, they didn't have a pimento eyed billionaire with straw bale hair then. Or fentanol. Love this experimentation. So much going on, and of course, your lyrics and melody bring it all home as usual. I can practically see the music and hear the colors in this. And I'm stone cold sober. I think.

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  @tspoon  Feb 13

  Joe this is fantastic. I really envy your stream of conscience tunes. I laughed, i cried, I swallowed more fentanal and dreamt about a border wall? very nice one.

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  @moonraccoon  Feb 12

  Sour and sarcastic and wonderful. This made my day!

• 

  @francessmith  Feb 12

  Love the lyrics. It sounds great, and like a lot of fun, which is always good, especially when it sounds as good as this.
  
  Very entertaining.

• 

  @ductapeguy Feb 12

  This is a trippy anthem for the the present... or the apocalypse. Lighten Up is a great title, but should you need an alternate, I was feeling "Subterranean MAGA Blues".
  This is you at your free association stream of consciousness best.

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  @spiegeltheeagle25 Feb 12

  love the diction. very descriptive words. funny experiential jokes and zingers. good fun.