My song “Death of Me” was originally a completely different song called “Autumn Leaves”. The only parts that are the same are the guitar, a bit of the melody, and one line.
When I was recording Dark Before Dawn, I realized that the lyrics of Autumn Leaves wasn’t quite working. The whole song was a metaphor for the passing on of grandparents, using the imagery of leaves in the Fall. It was written decently well, but it didn’t have much heart to it, which is because I wasn’t really writing from experience… I was writing more thematically. My producer, Adam Loewen, said (in the nicest way possible) that Autumn Leaves sounded like a teenage girl reciting her poem to an old folks home. Here are the original lyrics for you to laugh at if you wish:
Autumn leaves, when winter comes we won’t forget your colors
Autumn leaves, you’re beautiful; your character is in your wrinkles
Fall down gently underground
Lay still in peace
In time this tree will see more leaves
In colors of gold
Autumn leaves, your history is memorable; you made a home
Autumn leaves, when winter comes this family tree feels empty
The only line I wanted to keep was “Fall down gently underground. Lay still in peace.” Although it lost it’s irony when it was no longer talking about leaves falling underground, it was still a good line. I eventually thought of writing a song about a relationship dying - a love dying. This is something that I could write about from experience.
I remember being in the relationship and both of us would always tell each other that we love each other, but we rarely showed our love. I kept on hearing people say that love is a choice, which confused me. I thought that if I chose to say, “I love you,” and tried to believe that it was true, then everything would just fix itself. I didn’t realize that the choice involved real action as well. I think the advice, “Love is a choice,” is a bit misleading. I think the full message is that you need to choose to love someone and then act on that choice. In other words, “Love is a verb,” like Dc Talk sang (I can’t believe I just referenced an old-school Dc Talk song!).
After my relationship broke up, I read a book called The Five Love Languages. It’s too bad I didn’t read it earlier. It talks about how people express and experience love in different ways from one another. So sometime our love doesn’t get communicated because we are essentially speaking different languages. The five languages are: service, quality time, gifts, words of affirmation, and physical touch. People can speak all of these languages to some degree, but most people focus on one or two.
This book taught me how to act out my love (which I’m still working on). And obviously when people don’t act out their love, it dies. Hence my song, “Death of Me”. You can find it on iTunes.
Here are the lyrics:
The air escapes my lungs. My God what have I done?
I knew our time would come but, not yet
My heart is slowing down. My head is spinning ‘round
My mouth is spilling out regret
Fall down gently underground
Lay still in peace
My love will be the death of me
It doesn’t suffice
I swear I read your mind. I knew you every time
But you had one surprise, you lied
You used to share with me, strong integrity
Now that ceases to be, we died
Fall down gently underground
Lay still in peace
My love will be the death of me
It doesn’t suffice
It doesn’t suffice
Love doesn’t suffice
