‘Do You Remember’ was a big deal for me because it was my first attempt at recording harder rock and when we wrote this song were thinking of a Creed kind of vibe.  For a theme I thought about a break up song.  Almost everyone’s been through a bad one at some point so the song is totally relatable.  I remember practicing like a mad man because it was a new vocal style for me and of course I wanted to be at my best.  It required me to have more gruffness than I was used to so I had almost no voice left by the end of my recording session, but the results were certainly worth the effort.

We went out and rented some equipment for this and had the studio set up in a way to make for the best guitar and drum sounds.  Harreson James recorded backing vocals and acoustic guitar, using a handsome white Tanglewood model.  His vocal performance sounds like an actual rock star and our voices gel together very well.  For the heavy guitars we invited our go-to metalhead Tim Holman. It was Tim’s very first session for this album but now he’s on most of my tracks and always does a fantastic job.  ‘Do You Remember’ is no exception.  The huge rhythm guitars were recorded simultaneously through Marshall, Mesa-Boogie and Vox amps, carefully balanced to give the right combination of guts, energy and fierceness.  Playing his then favourite guitar, an Ibanez RG 550 signed by Steve Vai no less, Tim gave the solo a kind of modern version of an 80s lead which really rocked the song.  Drums were performed by Devin Kopp, who went on to play four more of my songs.  I’d never heard Devin before but he definitely didn’t disappoint and I love the double kick figures he put in the chorus.  My favourite drum parts are during the guitar solo but he basically rocked it throughout the whole song.  Finally Dean Dynna contributed earth-shaking bass thunder.  Everything just came together so well and really rocked.  I got goosebumps the first time I heard it.

My producer went out of his way to make sure the right equipment was there and that the studio was set up for optimum sound performance, as well as recording us all and making sure that we got the best sounding track.  He’s a great friend and I’m so grateful to have someone like him to work his magic on every song.  When he first encouraged me to try a harder rock style I wasn’t quite sure what to think but I’m glad we did.

Going into this song, I guess I really didn’t know what to expect but I can definitely say that any expectations I may have had were completely blown out of the water.  I hope you guys enjoy the end results.