This song was initially inspired by the Beatles’ “Revolver” album. I know that to be a fact, but I can’t articulate quite how! I began writing the song years ago. I recall working on it while I was at the Fes Festival of Sacred Music in 2004, it goes that far back. Like on “I Threw Your Heart,” the song includes a tricky rhythmic passage, where I am playing guitar in such a loose manner it’s hard to locate the downbeat, in this particular case partly to convey the lyric. Time will tell if it’s worth doing this stuff again, especially when it throws the players!

I love Chris Bleth’s zurna solo on this, as I suspect many people will. I used zurna years ago (i.e., also called “alghaita”) on ‘”Center Of My Universe” off of my This Perfect Day album, and I decided pretty early on this was the sound I wanted again for this song.  I spent a couple of years poking around LA trying to find the impossible – a zurna player capable of playing over changes like this. I think Rich Breen may have recommended I try Chris, an extremely busy session player around town who is known for being able to play just about any woodwind in existence.

Right around that same time I was complaining to Lyle Mays about all the problems I was having and he gave me a good piece of advice, saying “stop killing yourself...every time I find myself in that position I hire a great jazz player and I’m way better off.” I’m so glad I took that advice, because when Chris showed up for the session, not only was his musical vocabulary way broader, he also actually had a keyed zurna he had bought in Spain a few years earlier, which made it as flexible as a soprano sax.