Why Titanium?

In upcoming posts, we’re doing a deep dive into the songs on my recently released album including why I chose them, what drew me to each song, and my process.

My little man Harley, chose to start with Titanium. Actually when I asked him about Titanium, he wagged his tail, so that’s kinda like choosing it!.

I’ve always loved this song by Sia and Dave Guetta, it’s been on my cardio playlist for a while. Sia has such a rich tone, superlative vibrato and extensive range, I first heard her version of California Dreaming in LA at a club, and It was so good, I had to find the DJ to ask who was singing. I knew we had some vocal crossover traits ,as I also sing that veritable classic momma’s and poppas song.

After years of sweating halfway through my playlist, on my BowFlex PowerMax intervals at the point Titanium would play, I had a revelation, “this would be a great song for me”. Blame the endorphins.

I then began to sing along with it, getting the cadence’s and verses. Then, I realized that since Les Stansell and I love reducing classic great songs to ballads ,allowing the music and lyrics to take their naturally prominent place, Titanium would be a great candidate for this type of song.

It was pretty simple to figure out the chords. More difficult was transposing the chords so that I could hit that higher octave in the chorus. learned to change the key, when I was playing an outdoor show when I realized I was working way too hard trying to sustain the notes and hit the octaves. It was like I was tired after singing it. Well, that never happens, so it was easy to see I needed to make adjustments.

Once I adjusted the key, figured out the finger picking pattern and came up with some weird chord positions for my 4 string guitar, like magic, it was ready to play and record.

Click below to listen to Titanium and All of my new Album “Rise Up”.

Listen Here at hearnow

Enjoy!