I love this song so much. I shouldn’t even talk about my opinion is so heavily swayed. Ok, ok… I’ll try to stick to the facts...
This song was first conceived on the Sunshine Coast of British Columbia in April 2008. I spent a fantastic week with my Family out there and wrote the riffs for this song at a farm near Gibsons, BC- a magical place.
The riffs sat in a basic form for a while before the song was brought forward to the band in late January of 2009.
A defining point in the song occurred courtesy of Nick Elie. You’ll recognize the “bridge” in this song- the riff that connects that verse to the chorus. It was Nick’s brilliant idea to connect the verse with a “little bridge” and connect the chorus with a “big bridge”. After that everything seemed to fall into place. The final stage of the composition involved laying out the movements of Chris’s big guitar solo.
The Lyrics really fill the whole thing out of course. They came to me in a perfect little package, requiring only the slightest of polishing and refinement.
“Wiley are the clever, till their neck gets caught in a rope…” started it all but for sure it was a drinking song from the get-go. If you are a fan of bluegrass, Celtic, jigs or reels- know that I debated heavily on the full-on, sea-shanty possibility. In the end I decided to make it more grounded, give it textures of Earth. I think it helps to add to the family-coming-together aspect.
Tricks and Highlights
1)“Wash our mouths with soap” is an analogy for drinking beer. It should also convey how the characters in this song are discussing how bad things can happen, but they raise their glasses to “Never”, hoping, as we all do, that life and fate will be kind.
2)Whenever I write the lyrics, “Never” and “Forever”, they are always capitalized, as if proper nouns. Make of that what you will.
3)The guitar solo- What a masterpiece!! I wanted it big and winding and I got it. We perform two full measures of the verse which Chris solos over. Then we slide down to a slightly minor mode change. Back up to the verse for a measure then into a section of hits which lead into the epiphany where we perform, what Chris calls- The Band Tag. Sadly, big solos like this are a dying breed; today’s radio-friendly, pop-flavored rock and roll has no time for such diversions.
4)We rhyme “back” with “glass”, which is crazy if you think about it but most people never notice.
5) Rest assured the band has raised our glasses to Never many times!
