Alex Renbarger

Over the past Summer I spent the months of July and August living in Nashville. I had the goal to record my first CD as a solo artist. From the month of July through the end of this year, music had turned my world upside down…

From breakfast to dinner I was in the studio with producers Paul David and Zack Swift. I met Paul once before at a writers showcase at Opryland, but it was these two months of summer when I became acquainted with his precise hearing skills. Paul is one great producer, and Paul is one great guitarist. Paul and I had a great time just jamming out and ‘’jiving.’ Between out jam sessions, we recorded the tracks, ‘Angel of God,’ ‘Coming Home,’ and my favorite, ‘Silent be the Night.’ In my time with Paul, I wanted to stress simplistic, and raw sounding tracks. Because of this ‘authentic’ sound we were able to produce tracks that conveyed my emotions honestly. Like all great recording experiences, we recorded these tracks in Paul David’s house. We spent quite a significant amount of time recording vocal tracks over and over again, just to construct that ‘one’ vocal track. While I was not present in the Studio, Paul David did a great job aquatinting me with other skilled musicians, who ended up on the tracks. These musicians being, Julia Sinclair- who tracked the live cello,- Dexter Quito- who tracked the live violin,- and Ryan Richardson- who tracked the live drum tracks.

I had previously known Zach due to networking and co-writing through Darwin Moody. Along with producing, Zach is a truly gifted artist and writer. His ‘always stuck in my head’ hooks never have ceased to amaze me musically. It was in his little white house that we recorded, ‘Now that I Have You,’ and ‘Walk Away,’ the second and fourth tracks on the EP. We recorded the guitar and vocals in the practice room of his house, and afterwards listened to the numerous tracks in his bedroom and living room. It took three sessions to lay down all of the vocal tracks, and endless hours behind the scenes for laying down the music, and being able to create the right sounds for the right songs. Before we began the recording process, I knew that I would have Zach do these songs; because whenever I played them I felt a light pop radio vibe. I knew that he and Darwin would enjoy framing the simplistic, yet repetitive hooks, which create the basic foundation of these songs. I really had a wonderful time recording at Zack’s and at Paul’s studio. And I hope you as the listener realize that many relationships and memories were produced in the process of creating this self-entitled EP.