"Introspection"

“Introspection” - written by William White © 1996 William White

When we were kids, Will and I had that typical sibling competitive thing. A seismic shift in that dynamic occurred when we became musicians, him on guitar and me on keyboards. There was still a competitive thing there but it became more productive. As one of us made advancements on our instrument, the other unconsciously sought to leapfrog on theirs. Eventually (at Will’s suggestion), I picked up the bass, and the same dynamic blossomed even further. One former bandmate referred to it as, “that Wonder Twin Power shit,” confounded that we could start off a guitar and bass intro to a pretty complex song with no count in, like one big instrument. Even our vocal styles and harmonies developed and expanded in this symbiotic way.

I’ve always loved my brother’s lyric writing, and “Introspection” is a beautiful example. In the original version, the hook is the aggressive, angular guitar part, with the bass part built off of that. The challenge I set for myself was to remove the hook and replace it with a mosaic of multiple guitar loops. The inspiration here was our shared love of the Adrian Belew era of King Crimson, particularly the Three of a Perfect Pair album (we were weird kids…). Similarly, the strange effects textures around the verse vocal echo that of Crimson’s “Dig Me,” with the pre-chorus harmonies given a “Three of a Perfect Pair” claustrophobia. The bass part sticks fairly close to the original but I fractured the original 4/4 drive of the song with odd time signatures. The overall production intent is Three of a Perfect Pair meets Thomas Dolby’s “Dissidents” and Howard Jones’s “What Is Love?”, though the climbing synth lines are also a nod to Lye Mays’s work with Pat Metheney (see: “Phase Dance”).