In an effort to celebrate the official launch of djphillips.com, challenge my songwriting/ recording abilities and to take my own swipe at a 30 Day Project I will now post a new song idea every day for the next 30 days. These are not necessarily finished products. They are not necessarily fantastic pop nuggets. But they will be new ideas (written at least within the last few weeks). They will be (pretty much) on time. And they will be original.

Along with each posted song, I'll include a little story of the writing and recording process. If you're the kind of person who doesn't like to know what's behind a song, feel free to skip all the content below the track.

I'm putting these out there-- warts and all-- so let me know what you think! The songs that get a good response will be the most likely to be included on a future release.

Speak Up

I finally got a MIDI controller working with Logic (about 100% of the credit for that going to my awesome aforementioned friend Vince), so I decided to do a dance-y number. I've been wanting to do something more dance-oriented for a while plus I saw Phoenix last night and they were amazing. They really made me want to wiggle, so I am hoping for that effect with you fine folk.

Musically, I was just making the song up on the fly which was a really fun experiment. The danger is that you never know if you're really going to come up with anything worthwhile and have to scrap the idea for now. I had the idea of the shouted line "the last one to shout is the first to go" in my head. So I was trying to figure out what that might lead into and what it might mean. I started with just the drum and bass groove and I really wasn't sure where I was going to go with it. Luckily I worked out the chorus after a little while and built around that.

I created the drum loops myself with the keyboard and played the bass part on synth (obviously). So other than guitar and voice, it's all synthesized this time. Definitely a fun experiment and I'm pretty happy with the results.

I couldn't resist laying on a double guitar solo at the end. There's not much content to it, I'm just kind of weedley-wee-ing all about. It was fun, but I would probably do something more focused if I did more than a demo.

Lyrically, it's just kind of a general encouragement for people to speak up and say what they think. It's more about having confidence in what you believe than in any sort of political statement in this case. But you could pretty much take it whatever way you wanted and I don't mind that too much!

Speak Up

You've seen it all now Oh, you've seen it all You've seen the rise and fall

But you've kept your mouth shut Oh, you've kept your mouth shut You say it's not your call

But there's so much you want to say and you know The last one to shout is the first to go

Now put your hands up It's time to stand up We've gotta hear ya Come on and speak up

It's time to step up So keep your head up We've gotta hear ya Come on and speak up

You've come to terms now Oh, you've come to terms You think we'll never learn But you've kept your mouth shut Oh, you've kept your mouth shut It's not your concern

But there's so much you want to say and you know The last one to shout is the first to go

Now put your hands up It's time to stand up We've gotta hear ya Come on and speak up

It's time to step up So keep your head up We've gotta hear ya Come on and speak up

Hey, hey, hey, you've got to speak up Hey, hey, hey, you've got to speak up

The last one to shout is the first to go Now put your hands up It's time to stand up We've gotta hear ya Come on and speak up

It's time to step up So keep your head up We've gotta hear ya Come on and speak up