organizing an accident is a weekly newsletter where I leak home demos of unreleased songs, first draft lyrics, thoughts on the creative process, & dispatches from music life in Paris.
Listen to “Always” (demo):
This song was written on June 20, 2019
In the summer of 2019, just a few months before I would officially make the move to France, we spent three weeks road tripping, making stops in Ardèche, Saint Tropez, and Paris for apartment hunting.
That summer I saw the country, and Paris in particular, through a new lens. I visited what would become my humble studio in Saint-Germain, which was then just a small empty room with a table and chair. I sent out the first of many emails to book gigs for later that year. I came to better understand the landscape diversity that the small country had to offer in just a short train ride or drive. And France was also grappling with what has now become pretty regular August heat waves.
Throughout my travels, with little or no access to instruments, I pieced together songs however possible. As with today's demo: a song called “Always” that I wrote over an instrumental received by my good friend and collaborator, Sho Ishikura (check out his latest project JAN3T). The slick, synth-funk track is unchanged from what he sent me and was already a perfect bed to layer vocals over. Unfortunately, I could only record on my iPhone voice memo, and the resulting demo is more lo-fi than it perhaps deserves, but it still contains all the necessary “isness” required of a good song idea.
With love,
Ryan
From the vault
What I’m listening to this week
What I’ve been reading
Michel Houellebecq - Submission
Check out my previous demos and writing via the Substack archive + find my official music releases on Spotify, Apple, or your platform of choice. Stalk me across socials at @thisryanegan.
With love,
Ryan
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