Solo Cruise was a song I put together while playing the piano on Monday night (May 25th). I had jotted some lyrics down in my notes app a few minutes prior and simply wanted to see if I’d be able to sing them. I always had an intuitive knack for following melodies that I hadn’t memorized when I sang in choirs (or at least, harmonizing on the spot to fit the song’s chord as it played around me), so I thought I might be able to use that skill to come up with a melody of my own while playing some of my own chords underneath. Sure enough, I was able to! Solo Cruise is really the first song that is a product of this way of song-crafting, and I think the future is promising in this regard.

After playing it a few times on the piano, I decided to record a take with my phone and bring it into Logic. I enjoyed the play on cruising culture with nautical themes in the lyrics, so immediately my urge was to create an instrumental that gave pirate vibes. The accordion was my first choice here for a lead instrument, and sure enough, it stuck through til the end production. The original piano recording from my first demo is also present in the final mix, albeit with the vocals filtered out. Then, I added steel drums and xylophones to provide support for the main melody, taking inspiration from classic beach level themes from my favorite Nintendo games. Percussion is super over the top, but all I did was drag some loops onto the track so it doesn’t feel too notable to talk about. I’ll get there on my own one day! Me and my bongos against the world lol

My favorite part of the song’s production comes in for the bridge and finale. The first piece I ever worked on in Logic Pro was a remix of Taylor Swift’s August, where I aimed to give the song the ambience and style of her synth pop Lover album. I knew nothing about music production, but came up with a pretty nice mix that I still enjoy to this day. I made that August mix at about the same time as meeting the individual this song speaks to, and have grown to associate them together. The mix, its melodies, and its production decisions were a result of my emotional body at the time I met this person and first felt his love, and as such, are a reflection of that feeling as well. So for Solo Cruise, a song about that person, I actually lifted the original bridge melody that I wrote for that remix and used it again here. It means nothing to anyone but me, but it brings me so much joy: The melody “Micheal” inspired in me years ago has come to be the melody that shapes the grand finale of the song that I’ve made to memorialize my love for him, which is just pretty cool to me. my version of time travel