Love Reigned 2016 Album

March 30, 2016: (headphones please :)A remaster of LR was in the works for a while, but it seems now is the right time to post this given recent world events. A birthday wish of mine is for everyone on the planet to have a "rocky shore experience" ultimately allowing love to reign over all hate. The original release of this—my first fully realized singer-songwriter original—was in July 2013, just prior to JT's gift of a Yamaha keyboard synth. So the instruments performed here include 2 intertwining vibraphone parts on Korg keyboard, a bongo beat throughout, Epiphone drones for the "bass" end, 2 intertwining melodica parts, touches of harmonica, and an ending of metal kitchen trays struck with a cloth-covered meat tenderizer for those "gong" sounds. It opens with a marimba loop and, along the way, picks up conga and hi-hat loops I D/Led from online to painstakingly copy/paste into track layers.
Somewhere in answering original track comments, I noted my lead vocal here was merely a draft run-through done sitting down, desktop miked while a ceiling fan whirled above just to see how my lyrics matched up with marimba the way through. I got a bit verklempt when singing of the very personal mystical experience at the rocky shore and, otherwise as well, the main vocal is not my strongest. I considered rerecording it back then and also for this remaster, but decided the vulnerability heard in my draft vocal actually helps convey the power of personal experience. A big thank-you to JT's Audacity for boosting bass and volume in this final version and shout-outs to Ion Bodi and Marty Lucas for providing their ears and valuable input along the way! xxxooo
LOVE REIGNED © 2013 Kathleen A. Martin
I had settled in the City of Angels,
But a lucifer whisked me away
To a Second City, so windy, no pity.
Soon he left me one fall day.
 
That was a time past passed through.
Such a dark and a hard time on my way to you.
 
All alone and on edge in Evanston,
Edge of winter and of the Lake;
As the nights grew longer, my hurt grew stronger.
My heartbeat kept me awake.
 
That was a time past passed through.
Such a dark and a hard time on my way to you.
 
Came a day in May at the waterside:
The tears spilling down my face
Turned from pain to joy on that rocky shore
Within a flow of a glorious grace.
 
That was a time past passed through.
Such a right and a light time on my way to you.
 
I felt love washing all around me
Deep connection to every thing.
To each grain of sand, to the family of man
And every atom in between.
 
That was a time past passed through.
Such a right and a light time—I' m coming to you.
 
I floated home to my carriage house
With a great grin for all I greet
That's returned in kind, and now forgiven behind
Me is that devil in his defeat.
 
That was a time past passed through.
Such a right and a light time—I'm on my way to you.
 
[On my way to you/ On my way to you / On my way to you
I'm on my way to you / I'm coming to you / Coming to you]