"When Tomorrow Comes"

“There’s some really good ear candy happening there,” Robbie, a producer at The Minister’s recording studio nodded in response to a tweak his partner, Rob, at the soundboard made with a slide of a switch.

The session was going well, but after an hour plus of tweaking what had already been christened the second “final” cut of the track, I knew we weren't done yet.

I was excited that The Minister invited me to the recording session for his first ever single, “When Tomorrow Comes,” and even more excited that he hired me as his photographer (and by hired, I mean he suggested he might buy me a cup of coffee). We’d shot several hundred pictures in various lighting conditions, with myriad equipment, and from sundry angles. “Turn toward the camera,’ I’d say, or “Let’s try closing the shade.” Photography is a medium with which I’m comfortable; I know the language, and well versed in the lingo.

But when the Rob(bie)s started fine tuning, I felt like a visitor in a foreign land. They’d pontificated over issues I couldn’t hear: “It’s like a ball of music pushing the vocals,” Robbie said, frowning in response to about 2 seconds of melody they’d replayed at least a dozen times; or, “It takes the microphone away,” one would offer. “In a good way,” the other would respond. “Yes.”

I tried to hear the nuances: when an adjustment added “tons of aspiration,” or when they decided to “sweeten up the high end,” but I was operating at a primal, grunts-and-gestures level. Then Robbie sat back, crossed his arms behind his had and made an observation: “”Talking about music is like dancing about architecture,” he said. Rob agreed so heartily, he grabbed a marker and scrawled the quote across his board.

I suppose it’s appropriate then, that my son is proficient in a medium that defies words, because I am bereft of prose when it comes to describing the experience I have had over the past weeks, waking up in the night with his song running through the corners of my brain, trying to remember through my half-awake stupor the name of this musician and then recalling that it’s my son.

“When Tomorrow Comes” is out there now, on iTunes, Google Play, Amazon—probably wherever else you might go and look for music.  I encourage you to drop a buck on this piece of ear candy and, if you can find verbiage to describe your experience feel free to give it a try in the comments!

Brandon Davis "When Tomorrow Comes"--available now from all major outlets