|
The Stories Behind the Songs on the New Single
Fri., Oct. 2. 2020 3:22pm EDT
J. Jackson, lead singer and lyricist for ApologetiX here again.
Here's some more behind-the-scenes info about the two songs on our new single:
RIPPIN' OUT A WHOLE LOT OF FAVORITE PARTS
I've been wanting to spoof "Trippin' on a Hole in a Paper Heart" by Stone Temple Pilots ever since it first came out in 1996. I finally started actively working on it on September 13, 2019, and that's when I got the first two lines of the chorus. I got some other lines that day, too, but nothing that lasted.
I didn't really get a breakthrough on the lyrics till early September 2020. After that, everything came together quickly, and I wound up finishing on September 15, 2020, almost exactly one year later. The last thing I needed was the title, but once the lyrics were done, the title came easily. Wayne Bartley played guitars on this, and his friend Keith Uram played the bass.
This parody has a similar theme to "Bible O'Really" and "Second Timothy," so I wanted to add something to set it apart. Then I thought of two Bible passages we hadn't used in those two other parodies (or any other parodies) that I thought were very pertinent to the topic, Proverbs 30:5-6 and Revelation 22:18-19. I was familiar with those passages but couldn't have named the chapter and verse numbers off the top of my head. Now I can, thanks to this parody.
THESSALONIANS LETTERS
Although the title was the last thing I wrote for "Rippin' Out a Whole Lot of Favorite Parts," it was the first thing I wrote for this parody. In fact, I probably never would have considered spoofing this song if the idea for the title hadn't just popped into my head one day.
Paul's epistles to the Thessalonians could be his earliest letters (some think Galatians came first) but they discuss the last days, something that's on a lot of people's minds these days. I could have titled this "Thessalonian Letters" rather than "Thessalonians," but the letters weren't written by a Thessalonian; they were written to Thessalonians.
My daughter Janna and I saw Howard Jones in concert on June 20, 2016 at Stage AE in Pittsburgh — the same venue where ApX played on March 28, 2015 — along with Orchestral Maneuvers in the Dark and Barenaked Ladies. I sang along with the rest of the audience on the "whoa whoa whoa-oh" parts in "Things Can Only Get Better," never expecting that I'd be singing them myself in 2020.
Well, technically I sang the response vocals at Howard's concert and the lead vocals here. Rich Mannion sang the response vocals and played everything but the drums. He did a splendid job, as he does every time we give him a new song.
The photo on the cover of the single shows the Church of Saint Paul the Apostle in modern-day Thessaloniki.
|
