Tell Me What it Is

Lyrics

Music Notes This song started out as an Ode to Clyde Stubblefield (1943-2017), the original Funky Drummer in the James Brown band. The beat he laid down on the B-side song named Funky Drummer became one of the most sampled beats of all time. I would like to think that if Clyde had access to a double bass pedal, he might have played this variation. Niles belts his song with some powerful vocal cords and also plays rhythm guitar through my little Blackstar Studio 10 amp with KT88 tubes. He co-wrote the music with me. The synth sound behind the guitar solo was produced with the Fishman TriplePlay MIDI pickup feeding a Novation MiniNova.

Inspiration
Now Nicodemus, that dude had a lot of questions. When trying to understand the universe of things, we all have questions. My Mother-in-law, Elaine Smith (RIP) had some answers, as did Jesus in John 3:1-21. If you ever called Elaine Smith, you heard her answering machine say; “It is what it is, so tell me what it is”. She also said that “If we always do what we always do, do we always get what we always got”. I thought that was appropriate considering the challenge of climate change and how our environment is changing around us all the time.