Marc M. Cogman

Run Like Hell

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Written in Los Angeles, California and Portland, Oregon in May and June of 2006. First demoed on June 6th, 2006 at Record Plant in Hollywood. Recorded for Welcome to the Danger Show in September through December of 2006, at subSpot in Venice, California, the Fun-N-Only Room in Los Angeles, California, Dave's house in Mar Vista, and Record Plant in Hollywood. Brian Moskin on drums, JD Andrew on bass, Mike Butler on lap steel, Dave Delhomme on B3 organ, Reed Berin on cello, Marc M. Cogman on acoustic guitar, lead vocals and hand percussion, and Kelli Noftle on backing vocals.  

I was listening to a lot of Elliott Smith around the time I wrote this, and had decided on a sort of pilgrimage to Portland for a few days. It was also the occasion to play one of my first solo shows - I was still in a band at the time, so this was all still a new untested idea. I played a coffeehouse called the Red and Black Cafe on Cinco de Mayo of 2006. The music was pretty much finished as of Portland, and the lyrics were finished in June. I dedicated the song to 'Riz & Frogs', the two other members of my now defunt rock band. The life changes referenced metaphorically in the song aren't specific, but certainly some thoughts sprouted from my desire to move off on my own, musically. In this way, the "you can leave your friends behind" is a reference to them.

Foreign Movie

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Written in Los Angeles, California in June of 2006, and first demoed at home in Venice.  Recorded at subSpot in Venice except for acoustic guitars and vocals done at Record Plant in Hollywood.  Justin Siegel on drums and Frogs on bass.  The string quartet was made up of Reed Berin on the cello/bowed bass parts and Nita Mickley on violins.  Kelli sang backups and I played the acoustic, sang lead, and hit the tambourine.  

David Bazan, who performed as Pedro the Lion until 2006, was a big influence on my music as I went solo. The slow plod of this song, as well as a sense of dark, but deadpan self-deprecation are both echoes of his work.  It’s not a song that really begs for “interpretation” per se – though the sentiment may not be 100% clear.  For whatever reason, it’s a representation of complicated feelings surrounding what was a very complicated friendship/relationship I was in the midst of at the time.  In this way, it’s retained a sense of biographical importance despite not being as clear and accurate a “story-telling” song as other songs I wrote about the relationship, such as “Chiaroscuro” and “Incurable Blues.” 

As well as being a live mainstay with the Dead Messengers, “Foreign Movie” has become my unofficial opener for nearly every one of my solo acoustic shows from 2009 – on.

Lonely, Lonely

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Written in pieces throughout 2006, finally coming together more or less in-studio as we were tracking Danger Show.  If I remember correctly, the main guitar-line was something I’d had floating around for many months, even as far back as Neon Calm jam sessions, where it was rejected as a song prospect.  Justin Siegel on drums, Frogs on bass, Reed Berin on cellos, Nelson Lindsley on electric guitar (except for one lead lick leading into the outro, for which he handed the guitar to Reed Berin), Giulio Carmassi on piano.  I played hand percussion, acoustic guitar and sang the lead and numerous backing vocal tracks. 

Despite the fact that this song has been performed live exactly once – at the CD release show in March of 2007 in Burbank, CA – I love it.  It’s the indie-rock anthem I always wanted Neon Calm to write.  More glossy in production that most of Danger Show, it never really found a home with my live band, a fact which disappoints me somewhat.  I was happy when video director Sonya Strich gave it new listeners with her excellent video in 2009.  The song, fairly evidently, is about me, and deals with themes I’ve revisited with every subsequent record – the artist experience, and philosophical questions about what “happiness” can be for people who create certain types of art and live a certain type of existence.  They are rhetorical questions, I suppose, as I’m no closer to answering them all these years later.

I Can't Fix It

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Written in July or August of 2006, just demoed with Garageband, and recorded for Danger Show at a variety of locations.  Justin Siegel and Frogs played the drums and bass, respectively.  I played the upright piano, glockenspiel, hand-percussion, harmonica, acoustic guitars and sang all the vocals.  Dave Delhomme added the B3 organ and Nelson Lindsley the electric guitars.

This tune stands out as a bit different from the others as it’s the only “relationship” song on the record about a different relationship.  While the others were focused elsewhere, I wrote this song post-breakup about the three and a half year relationship that had just ended a couple months prior.  All in all, this song’s about how sometimes, knowing a decision was the right one doesn’t make it suck any less, on an emotional level.  After not seeing the girl I wrote this song about for over four years, we crossed paths on tour in Chicago in the fall of 2010 and attended each other’s shows, and I got to play her this one for the first time.

Chiaroscuro

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Written in the summer of 2006. Kelli Noftle taught me how to finger-pick in this 4-finger pattern, so after practicing the pattern for almost three days straight, I'd pretty much written my first finger-picking song.  As for the lyrics, they pretty much speak for themselves.

Nita Mickley plays violin. Kelli sings with me, and that's her at the end whispering one of her poems. Recorded all in one session at Record Plant in Hollywood in the fall of 2006. Nate Hurtweck engineered the session.

Porcelain

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Written on Martha’s Vineyard in the summer of 1999, I’d originally intended this song (along with another, “Riptide”) for my high school band.  A month later, I was in Chimpira – a stylistic mismatch for the song, and while “Riptide” returned on the first Neon Calm record in 2002, “Porcelain” stayed buried until I dug it out for demoing on June 6, 2006 at Record Plant, and subsequently, for solo shows that summer.  While originally written as an experiment in alternate tunings, I eventually brought it back to standard.  It was recorded  at subSpot (Justin Siegel’s drums, Frogs’ bass, Nita Mickley’s violin & Kelli’s backing vocals), Giulio’s Carmassi’s house (for his piano and bowed vibraphone), and Archon (my acoustic guitar and lead vocals).  

This song was written about the suicide attempt of a friend, and while it always bugged me a little about the lack of a lyrical connection to the rest of Welcome to the Danger Show, the song always managed to make the cut as an album track and live show number because it just always turned out so darn beautiful (especially live when Steve McDonald started reinterpreting the violin parts with his e-bow).

We

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I'm a romantic, always have been. Only ridiculous romantics ever identify themselves as poets. This tune is the romance with romance. The romance with music and art and the romance with those first earth-shattering moments of self-definition. You find it and nurture it and build your personal mythos, which you get to carry around, hopefully forever.

I dedicated this song on the record to Brian Moskin because he heard me knocking immediately. So did my big brother Bryan Cogman, so it's sort of for him too. It's the second-oldest song in the repertoire (only "Porcelain" beats it out). I wrote this one long before I knew what to do with it, before I'd "gone solo" and all that, probably in 2005.

I'm playing the acoustic and singing and playing harp, as always. Kelli Noftle sings backup. Steve McDonald played lead guitar (on the day I first met him, coincidentally. This was our first ever collaboration.) Daniel Damico played upright piano. Dave Delhomme played the B3 organ. This track is unique in that it's not Frogs on upright bass, it's actually Giulio Carmassi.  Justin Siegel plays the drums. Lead vocals and acoustic guitars were done at Archon in Sherman Oaks. Organ at Dave's house and bass at Giulio's house. The rest of the instruments were done at subSPOT in Venice.

Complete

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Written in April of 2006, this was the first of the Danger Show songs to be written (with the exception of “Porcelain” and “We”, which were earlier songs I already had prior to plans for a solo album).  It was first demoed at Record Plant on June 6, 2006.  This was the one song we had no idea how to orchestrate, so we recorded tons of different stuff: drums (both standard and sort of timpani-style), warbly electric guitar, organ, piano, etc.   Ultimately, we realized the song was the most powerful with only the acoustic guitar and vocals done at Archon, a shaker recorded at subSpot, and Giulio Carmassi’s beautiful Wurlitzer track, recorded at his house. 

Yet another “doomed relationship” song.  It’s many people’s favorite, including my father.  While I’ve tried playing it solo on guitar a handful of times, I typically will only perform it now if Giulio is there to join me, either on Wurlitzer or acoustic piano.

Incurable Blues

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Gather round and I'll tell you a story. It's not the whole story, but it's a good look at some of it, "in medias res" as the Latin folks say. I will tell you I remember sitting at the Novel Cafe in Ocean Park scribbling this down in my little leather book and thinking, "I can never play it. Not out loud." But the artist in me outweighed the rational humanoid and of course I played it anyway, against my better judgement. Played it and recorded it and as it turns out the world didn't end.

The second-to last song written for Danger Show, finished just in time to track drums with the others. Those drums were played by Justin Siegel.  I handled the hand percussion with Brian Moskin's help.   Steve McDonald played electric and Dave Delhomme played B3 organ.   Daniel Damico played upright piano and Frogs played bass. That's Kelli Noftle in the end, of course.

The handclaps in the outro were a snap because all I had to do was lean out my window and call down to the patio, where my kid brother Clay was having a party, "Hey! Who wants to be on a rock'n'roll record?" As it turned out, that was Rachelle Tabin, Mark Bossellman, my brother Clay Cogman and his wife Ashley (though she was just his girlfriend back then.) Justin Siegel and Kelli and I clapped along as well. The acoustic guitars and lead vocals were done at Archon in Sherman Oaks, and the organ was done at Dave's House. Most of the hand percussion took place in the Fun-N-Only Room, but all the rest was at subSPOT in Venice, throughout the fall of 2006.

This Won't Last

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Written and recorded in entirety on Halloween night, 2006.  Come home from a dinner date and the "words come flooding out."  Played the piano, sleigh bells, guitar, harmonica, and sang at subSPOT, all by my lonesome, and then a few weeks later we went down to the Fun-N-Only Room and Brian Moskin retracked the drums.  

Super simple song, super simple lyrics, no interpretation necessary.  This song came at least a month after all the others on the album, and was dedicated, like most on the album to that infamous femme fatale of the moment.  

I like the way the harmonica drowns in reverb at the end. I think it's sad and pretty.