IVORY CIRCLE

I don’t know if Chris remembers this, but one of our first interactions involved an in-depth conversation about music and Copeland’s You Are My Sunshine had just been released—we both raved about how much we loved the album and it was the first of many indicators for me that we had similar music sensibilities.  I’ve been a fan of Copeland since I was a sophomore in college, when I saw them open for Switchfoot at a concert on my school campus. When they broke up, we lamented about how it was such a shame we wouldn’t get to hear any more music from them.

Last month, I wrote about what it was like for me to release “Pretend,” Ivory Circle’s first single.  I decided to release the song through as many social media avenues I could think of: Facebook, Soundcloud, Reverbnation, Twitter, and Tumblr, to name a few.  I almost didn’t release it through Twitter—only because I am terribly inept at using it and doubted whether it would make much of a difference if I had an account or not.

However, on a whim, I decided to create a new Twitter handle for Ivory Circle and went through my own personal account to look for any music related accounts I could follow through my new username.  One of those accounts belonged to Aaron Marsh, the lead-singer of Copeland, and on the day I published my first tweet, I had a DM from him shortly after, which said that he enjoyed the song.

I pooped my pants and then we became best friends.  Okay, not exactly either of those things, but he was nice enough to respond to my messages and let me keep in touch through email.

When I gathered the courage to ask him if he would be willing to sing on a recording, I was ecstatic when he agreed.   Originally, I planned on having him possibly sing the male vocals in a duet I had already written, “Walk With Me,” but the more I thought about it, I decided I really wanted to write something completely different, with Aaron’s voice in mind.

“Put Me Back Together” was one of the first songs I wrote after my dad died.  It was also one of the hardest—I would break down in fits of tears every time I sat down to try to write a new line of the song.  I had the idea that the song would be this interwoven narrative between three different relationships: My dad and me, my dad and God, God and me.  It became a project to help me get through the process of my grief, bringing light to the moments I experienced during this time: how I would look in the mirror and not recognize myself, and later how I would acknowledge that the broken pieces would not be put back in the places they resided before.  It wasn’t something I really wanted to admit—you don’t just mourn the loss of the person who died but you also mourn who you were before it happened.  I spoke to my counselor about how I agonized over this song and all I wanted to do was just finish it, but it would mean I’d have to address my own pride and lack of ability to be strong enough to do all of this on my own.  I wish I could remember the exact words she told me that got me through my writer’s block, but the day after I met with her, I was finally able to finish the rest of the song on my piano.

I won’t go into a line-by-line analysis with this one, but I guess it might interest some to know that my intention with this song was to look at it as the same conversation, three times.  Essentially, my voice is of the broken, grieving human.  Aaron’s voice is of the responder.

You can see my branches on the ground You can hear the voices, bitter sounds You can feel the dirt underneath your feet It’s gone and made a mess of me

Swallow your pride Be strong Don’t follow the tide It’s wrong to fight against a beating heart It’s only hardest at the start

All I want is for you to put me back together Put me back together All I want is for you to put me back together Put me back together

Can you feel my last trace of my acclaim Has fallen with my fight to be known by my name Can you see that I’m not strong, I am weak Can you tell that I’m not who I was made to be

Swallow your pride Be strong (I can’t) Don’t follow the tide  (I can’t) It’s wrong to fight against a beating heart It’s only hardest at the start

And all I want…

Wrap your arms around the scars Around the tears Around the reasons why we’re scared of who we are Around our faults Around our dreams Around the pieces of ourselves that have been torn apart We’ve been torn apart

All I want is for you to put me back together Put me back together All I want is for you to put me back together Put me back together