This post shares information about my buddy (bassist and barber-extraordinare), Billy Lee’s and my multi-year project, “It’s You.” Before sharing details about our project, a little background information…
Billy Lee and I first met sometime around 1975 while I was playing at the Huntsville (AL, USA) Hilton and he was playing at the Carriage Inn on University Drive. I often went into the Hilton lounge after I finished playing for dinner in the (Hilton) Pepper Tree Restaurant, next door. It was at this time that I met and became friends with the Hilton band members: Pat Huggins (master-of-ceremonies, bassist, and vocalist), Guy Hornbuckle (keyboardist–bandleader), and Danny Harrison (drummer). Danny shared a house near the Carriage Inn with Billy and another fellow, Mike Harrison (no relation to Danny) who has also remained a lifelong friend.
Sometime around 1976, Billy and I joined the Reflections dance band (featuring vocalist, Roberta Silva) at Huntsville’s Sheraton Motor Inn and played there for the next two and a half years. In an extended power-play gone bad for us, the band broke up and Roberta stayed at the Sheraton, forming a new band without us. The story is long and some parts are quite painful, so I’ll summarize. Things were pretty hard for us for a couple of years.
After some time, both of us went back to school — Billy, to become a master-barber and I, to become a software-engineer. Billy and I have remained soul-brothers through these years.
In 1999, not long after I returned to Huntsville from St. Louis, MO, Billy and I began our project to record a selected group of Billy’s original songs. Originally, we planned to record five or six songs from his extensive collection of compositions. We usually managed only one work session per week, and sometimes, weeks and even months transpired without us working at all. It was not until 2004 that we finally considered the project “finished” enough to record to CD. Even at the “end,” I knew there were still many details that Billy wanted to tweak. But, I was impatient, was having many problems with my aged G3 Macintosh computer (replaced in 2006), and wished to be able to say that we were finally “through.” By 2009, I posted the initial version of the project online.
Billy at the keyboard in CMM’s Studio #1
On the recordings, Billy sings all lead vocals, plays all guitar parts, and most of the bass parts. Project notes excerpted from emails I sent, 1999 – 2014, indicate that our mutual friend, Bobby Glenn recorded bass on “Like You Did To Me.”
In 2014, I returned to our project to address Billy’s and my concerns. I remixed and remastered the three selections to hopefully resolve most of the issues we had with the first version. I hope that you enjoy 2014’s update of these songs.
The “It’s You” Songs
Like You Did To Me – This was the first song that Billy and I recorded. This catchy tune gives tongue-in-cheek advice to a departing lover. The tune’s guitar-solo features Billy’s iconic guitar styling. Piano and synthesizer-brass parts are played by me. Bobby Shepard played drums.
It’s You – This sadly-tender love-ballad is sung by someone willing to do anything for another, one who may not have realized how much they were loved. The song features one of Billy’s finest-ever guitar solos. As arranger, I was able to press the solo into double-duty – to help tie things together at the end of the arrangement. Billy played all keyboard parts on this song. Rusty Reeves played drums.
Baby, Come On Back – Jilted by a heartless lover, this song invites the prodigal back so that the singer can turn the tables and return the favor by walking out the door. Piano and organ parts are played by me. Phil McClendon played drums.
Click to expand “It’s You” project notes, excerpted from my sent emails: 1999 - 2014
| Date | Commentary excerpted from email sent by SMOjr | Date | Commentary |
|---|---|---|---|
| 9/13/99 | (Initial recording session) I helped Billy this evening to begin some recording that I will help him with. | 9/16/99 | I went after work and got a haircut (from Billy). He’s fine and is excited, I think, that we’re going to work on his songs. |
| 11/15/99 | Tonight is the night that I’d arranged to do recording with Billy. I had erroneously arranged for M&D (parents) to come, also, but will offer them a “raincheck.” | 11/15/99 | Billy just left. We recorded Bass, Guitar, and Piano of his first song (there are 3 we’ll do, initially). Next week we’ll record vocals, and maybe I will beef-up the piano part I (mis)played this eve. |
| 11/22/99 | Billy left (from his now weekly Monday night recording session, here) a little before 9. We had quite a productive session — recording two versions of his vocal solo, fixing one flubbed measure on the bass audio part, and for fun, generating a set of harmony vocals (that we won’t probably keep…). | 11/29/99 | Billy left from our weekly Monday-night session a few minutes ago. We have almost finished the first song of 3. I would feel like we’re slow, but I know that many bands take a year to record an album… |
| 12/6/99 | Billy begged off from our weekly recording tonight because of having a sore-throat and mild cold. I told him I thought that was a good idea. | 1/5/00 | Billy and I got a good bit done on his 2nd song, tonight. He recorded a bass part and a couple of keyboard tracks. We spent about 2 hours, and that took the eve. |
| 1/10/00 | Billy and I recorded 3 takes of his vocal for the 2nd song. Maybe I’ll have a mix by the w/e of the 21st. | 1/11/00 | I don’t know where the evening has gone. I worked for a while on listening to the various miking techniques that I used last night to record Billy — trying to decide which “sound” that I like best. Also, trying to decide how to get a still-better vocal performance from him… |
| 1/24/00 | I worked with Billy this eve. We re-recorded the lost Bass and Guitar parts. And, we’re finally getting the first (song) whipped into shape, and are making progress on the second (song). | 2/6/00 | May do a little work this morning to try to split Billy’s session which is a long linear recording which has 3 songs — into 3 separate sequences which will enable easier manipulation, etc. |
| 2/7/00 | Then, I worked with Billy till nearly 8. We fixed a bass part into which I’d accidentally recorded keyboard also. | 3/27/00 | (To friend, Kenny regarding his proposed Tuesday visit) Actually both Billy and Rusty are planning to come. Rusty is bringing some old tapes of the Reflections and his recorder for dubbing. I doubt that, of all times, Tuesday will be good…. Too bad Tuesday’s your only available time… Que Malo. |
| 4/25/00 | Had a recording work-session this evening with Rusty and Billy. We, for the first time, set up Rusty’s (own) MIDI drum “machine,” and I showed him how to best set it up for our future work together. He didn’t know much about using it in a MIDI setup such as mine, so the tutelage was both appreciated and needed. Billy knows that this work is ultimately to benefit his songs, so he was “right in there.” | 5/2/00 | I’ve spent the eve working with Billy and Rusty, beginning recording of a new tune from Billy. Tonight Billy recorded a piano part, bass part, and Rusty “laid down” a drum part. Since they left about 8 I’ve done little except eat my evening “meal.” |
| 5/16/00 | Then we had our weekly recording session. We recorded a vocal track. It had been so long since last recording vocals, that I could scarcely remember how… 🙂 | 5/23/00 | Billy came by for a while this eve (Tues), and I got a copy of words to the (new) song of his that we’ve recently started recording. |
| 6/20/00 | Worked with Billy this eve. Had crashing problems with Performer when we tried to record. It happened several times consecutively. I realized that the problem reminded me of a problem discussed previously on “the list” (Performer users). To make a long story shorter, the email I’d saved was, indeed, relevant. And, making the corrections suggested in the mail, fixed my problem. | 6/27/00 | Worked this eve with Billy. Bobby Glenn is in town and came with Billy. Bobby re-recorded a bass part for the song of Billy’s we’re working on at the moment. |
| 7/11/00 | Then this eve I worked with Billy. We recorded one track and worked only about and hour, and talked for a while more. | 7/12/00 | (From sister, Cathy)
It’s not practice. I’m recording Billy. |
| 7/18/00 | (From sister, Cathy)
We worked from 6 till 7. So, that wasn’t that long. |
1/14/03 | I’ve still got some wiring to do before resuming vocal recording here. I need to run mic cables from the upstairs studio to both downstairs rooms. |
| 6/12/03 | I’ve been up this morning working, readying audio files for upload to Bobby Shepard. He will record drum tracks for Billy’s songs. This first go-round is a test to see what will be the audio file format we will use for exchange. I’m hoping for a minimal required conversion(s) (it’s often a multi-step conversion process). That could get to be tedious. The first “test file” is uploading as I’m writing this. It’s nice to have ADSL fast-Internet. But the “A” part of ADSL is asynchronous — which means simply that uploads can be MUCH slower than downloads. (Now, it looks like the 18 minute transfer may have failed. I don’t know what happened. Oh, well!! That, and my machine locking-up about 3 times this morning while doing conversions, etc. Lot’s of fun). | 7/23/03 | Billy and I worked last eve. And, that also went pretty well. We re-recorded the vocals to one song — and got a vocal that was much more to our liking than the one it replaced. |
| 7/29/03 | P.S. This is Billy’s and my recording night (unless he cancels….) | 8/1/03 | I have been working on vocal processing using the MU100R over the last few days — trying to regenerate harmony vocals for Billy’s song. The harmony vocals were sounding quite bad. I finally discovered several reasons and generated an initial, new harmony vocal track last evening. I’m still not quite happy with it and will work with it a little more this morn. |
| 11/30/03 | (Note to drummer, Bobby Shepard) I have FTP uploaded 3 files from Billy’s “Baby, Come on Back”: a vocal mix, an instrumental mix, and a MIDI file with matching tempo map and a track with a side-stick snare click (you may/will need to appropriately reassign MIDI channel and note…). The audio files are 48K / 16 bit Windows WAV files. They should sit at T-zero (flush at the beginning) of the midi file. | 5/18/04 | This evening Billy and Phil McClendon (drummer) will come here to record the final drum track on the last of 4 or 5 songs that Billy and I have been working (?) on since ’98, or so….. Unbelievable that I’ve had to be the one to consistently drive this project along…… Maybe with one more sustained push from me — we can get this project “in the can….” |
| 5/25/04 | Tonight, I (supposedly) work with Billy, here. I worked last evening rendering MIDI drum tracks (recorded last week) to audio. I then “moved” them to the upstairs studio and put them into place in the normal project. So, in the event that Billy does visit tonight, that’s what I’ll be doing this eve. | 5/27/04 | Then I worked with problems in my studio last evening. I moved Billy’s project from my internal hard-drive to my external hard-drive. And, although I had different problems — It was a still completely frustrating experience with the computer “locking-up,” etc. every time I tried to record and even play…… I have one more option to try — moving the project BACK to the Jaz cartridge drive (where it began). Maybe, just maybe, this will allow me to finish on this computer without having to move downstairs. I really don’t want to do that because of having to move my studio monitors down there and also because I’m not accustomed to the acoustics down there. I’ll try copying the project to the Jaz drive and will keep my fingers crossed. |
| 6/15/04 | I’m wondering whether Billy will remember tonight’s (scheduled) work-session. Hopefully, we will make the rear CD cover tonight and he will select from one-or-the-other of the two designs for the front cover that I have made…. | 6/16/04 | Speaking of getting something / anything done — Billy and I finished the CD cover last night. And, that’s one project that’s “in the can” as the expression goes. I guess that the origin of that is probably from film, and is speaking of the film canister….. (?). |
| 1/19/14 | I performed the “re-record” of all three of Billy’s songs yesterday. However, on my final check, I was STILL not happy with the reverb (too much ambience) on one of the vocals. So, this morning I will re-work that one mix, one more time. After that I will crank up the CD factory to make both a few of the Billy CD and also a few more of my Christmas CD, to have a few extra on hand (I only have one left). |
Good song by Lilly Bee. I, also, did think the guitar solo was fabulousa!