Bass Thumper, David, Mario, Guitarhacker, James, Marty, Vic, Dan, ray, and Misha:

Wow, some great comments above . . . thanks all for the careful listen and feedback. Based on all the above I tinkered with the existing track and have explored an alternative mix (though I’m not sure how far that will go). Hopefully, I haven’t swung too far to the other way on some of the changes. A few responses on your comments that highlight the changes:

Bass Thumper: I’ve upped the BGVs on the bridge per your suggestion. I increased the volume of the vocal a tad on “skies”. I’m not sure whether you were looking for a bigger, longer note, but not what I want to do there, as I think it would diminish the bigger notes later on . . . Good suggestion on adding a piano, and I hear what you are thinking. I did try a few tracks as I play with an alternative mix, but it kind of gets a little lost. Not sure I’ll go there in the end.

David S: Totally agree on a layered production approach and I try to go that direction any time I can . . . but, yes, not here . . . and the fact that I had limited guitar riffs that actually worked, it is a bit repetitive. I have started working on an alternative mix—e.g., staring with just the baritone guitar, bass and vocal, with the drums kicking in on the chorus, then the electric rhythm after the chorus . . . and adding more instruments (kinda like the organ I was playing with, but the acoustic guitars haven’t quite meshed) . . . but ultimately not sure it’s going to work. But we’ll see.

BTW, my acoustic playing on the original was a bit messy at times, and in this version, the baritone guitar essentially replaces it.

Vic: I've dialed up harmonies on the “Everybody Says” refrain in the revised version.

Rayc: I dialed down the volume just a tad on that guitar . . . oddly enough, it’s the only track I retained from the original.

Misha: I’ve added some more reverb and such to the lead vocal and made the entire track a bit more wet. As for the upload, it was a WAV but only 16 bit. The revised version is a 24 bit.

Thanks again all. Ultimately, I’m thinking this may need to go on the back burner and revisited another 5 years from now, LOL!

Deej