This is one of a series of songs recorded live (and low-tech!) during Thomas Dolby's Spring 2012 Time Capsule Tour.
Comments from Thomas Dolby (vocals, keyboards):
It's a pleasure and an honour to sing this onstage with a bunch of great musicians, because I know how much the song means to people. I consider it among the top three or four best songs I've ever written. And please, any passing similarity to the Backstreet Boys' 'I Want It That Way' (written 10 years later and one of the biggest-selling singles in history!) is entirely coincidental ;-)
My wink at about 1'40 is because I've just told the story of how I got outted as a bad geographer by a New Orleans radio host for mentioning the Everglades in a song about Louisiana.
I play mainly piano in this; gated Rhodes and Hammond organ in the verses; a swampy ES2 patch in the bridge that I call Kate's Bush; a couple of thunderous storm samples, and one that sounds a bit like a siren. Strings sneak in to double the chords towards the end.
Comments from Aaron Jonah Lewis (fiddle, fretless banjo):
Such a beautiful song and always a crowd favorite. The intro was always intense for me, keeping the melody soaring and open while playing in perfect rhythm with the click track. (Mat occasionally has to snap us back in time with the hi-hat on this recording. It was always a proud moment when we could pull the intro off without any corrections from Mat, but no big deal when we needed his intervention.) I love playing the banjo on this song, too. Taking the classic bluegrass rolling patterns for the right hand and using them in this song works out really nicely, and I love to sing along, too. This was one of the songs that would continue on in my head for hours or days after a show was over.
Comments from Mat Hector (drums):
This track is all about the groove for me. Locking in with the fantastic bass riff and the sixteenth note shaker is the absolute main thing to make the whole thing groove and sit. While Thomas is talking about this song before we start I have a metronome in my ear already giving me the exact tempo. So while he's talking I'm already getting locking into the tempo. This also lets me give an inkling to the rest of the band of the tempo. The tricky part of the intro is conducting the band and keeping them in time with the sequencer that's running. When I'm playing a groove this is easy, but when I'm playing nothing it gets a little trickier! The great groove aside, my other favorite part of playing this song is the high belt vocal I get to sing in the chorus. Although sometimes I'm a little pitchy it's a line I try and sing out with passion.
Comments from Kevin Armstrong (guitar):
play a very saturated distortion sound for the intro and break it really is creamy and lovely. On the intro I love the way the piano guitar and fiddle blend together like one instrument. It's great when the song settles in to a swampy downbeat groove at 0:58. When we sing the choruses we really have a challenge keeping together. In tune and sort of expressionless with long notes and no bending is the plot. If we get it wrong it just sounds like a few drunk blokes on a night out all slurring their way through a folk tune or something.
At the end of the first chorus at 3:20 I sing the Gooood after TD and my foot has to hover over that massive fuzz button which I have to mash on the downbeat for the tune. I can't see it I just have to guess where it is and hope for the best..