Welcome to Singled Out! where we ask artists to tell us the inside story of their latest single. Today Joshua Sorhagen from Alamance tells us about "Your Eyes" from their brand new album "In The Moment". We now turn it over to Joshua for the story:"Your Eyes" began as a simple piano riff that I had for about a year prior to ever bringing it into the studio. During that time, I was constantly messing around with various tempos and rhythmic arrangements, all around the same basic structure. For a moment I'd want a more upbeat or happier sound and then change my mind the next instant, deciding that the structure would sound better in powerful rhythmic movements. In the end , however, it was the original plain-and-simple that Rob Freeman and I decided to go with for the recording; it met somewhere right in the middle of what I was looking for, balancing emotion and power with a classic pop twist. When we began tracking "Your Eyes", I encountered many of the same things I do when writing with Rob Freeman. His talent is unbelievable and his ear for what sounds great is impeccable. While Rob provided the perfect background guitar riffs and chorus structure, I created a verse melody that I thought made for a perfect balance between sensitive emotion and catchy pop material. Furthermore, while tracking vocals I insisted on using new techniques I had learned to help me truly capture the emotion behind the lyrics in the song. I didn't hesitate to throw in some vocal 'gravel' and really tried to make the listeners feel like it was them I was talking to.
My deep and true love for harder, edgier music had to come through somewhere in my new creation, and so the solo I envisioned for the bridge along with the passionate vocals led to a bridge that we thought brought a new dimension to the song. In addition, we had to add the classic half-time last chorus to really drive things home on the power side. Robs incredible ear led to some creative and stunning harmonies as always, although I did have to suck some helium for a few of them (just kidding).
Lyrically speaking, all the credit for this track can go to my girlfriend. If it wasn't for teal-brown-golden-blue ever-changing eyes (now I'm not kidding) the song would have never been written. This is my girlfriends second song on the record as well, the first one being "I Believe". It's very easy for me to find the inspiration to write songs about her. It's something that for some reason just comes natural, almost as if that's what my mind wants me to write. It's always interesting to watch how the song develops though. You know, you can't just be singing lines like "I love your multi-colored eyessssss!"... "They are sooooo pretty!" (That's a bit what my journal looks like though, don't judge me).
After we were done tracking "Your Eyes", we knew that this was the one. I was way overdue in making my first real music video and so with the recommendation from Rob, we began discussing various arrangements for a music video with Ten Phoenix, a couple local guys who had done some work for Rob in the past. I had my own visions for the video, but I always love to keep my opinions to myself until I get to hear from others, that way I don't skew their opinion. I asked the guys to take a listen and let me know what they thought the video should look like based on the lyrics. When we pieced together both of our ideas we ended up in Times Square and Central Park with me playing a photographer and my girlfriend as a model. The photographer idea popped up because we wanted to be able to get nice and close up shots of my girlfriends eyes without being cheesy. Making the video and acting the parts was one of the best experiences I've had. The crew was amazing and we had so much fun in every part of the shooting, aside from the freezing wind that had us shivering all morning. The more we stopped following directors orders and started just playing the parts, the better and better we got at it. It wasn't too difficult pretending to be in love with the girl I'm already in love with.
Hearing is believing. Now that you know the story behind the song, listen for yourself and learn more about the album right here!
