The Stories Behind The Songs

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Helms Place

submitted by Billy McLaughlin

When I was in college, I lived in Los Angeles in a house that was right next to the busiest freeway in the world - the Santa Monica freeway.

The noise was unbelievable, but after months and months it became a kind of constant rhythm in the background. I wanted to try to capture that constant beat and the excitement of it with my guitar.

I named the piece after the street I lived on - Helms Place.

Tsavo

submitted by Billy McLaughlin

Most of this piece was written by a very close friend of mine, Dirk Freymuth, while he was on a trip to Africa.

There is a national park in Kenya called Tsavo, and this piece features melodies and rhythms that Dirk heard when he was there. He brought the main part of the piece home and we spent hours taking it in various directions until a more definite form emerged.

It is a long piece that journeys through many sections, very much like a musical safari.

Stormseeker

submitted by Billy McLaughlin

I live in a part of the country that gets a lot of thunderstorms and tornados.

Even though it can be scary at times, for some reason I really like it when it gets stormy. You can always tell when a big storm is coming, because it usually gets kind of quiet and eerie before everything starts crashing down.

This piece works the same way, going from kind of soft and eerie to crashing all about.