There have only been 2 songs that I’ve heard in a dream and somehow managed to wake up and then get up and put them on tape. Day of Reckoning is one of those 2 songs. I heard this hook playing in my head. It was getting louder and I could tell that it was worth remembering. At that point I was starting to wake up. I could tell I was asleep and that I had a choice to make. Continue to sleep or wake up and try to remember what I was hearing.
I knew I had to make a decision quickly because I was becoming awake, and the song was starting to fade. I knew from experience that if I didn’t get up, I would not remember the tune. I listened one more time to try and set the melody in my mind and then woke up. It was 3am and I went to get my guitar to try and find the melody I had been dreaming. When I found the key to sing it in, I got my camcorder and went downstairs to record in my office. I placed the camera down in front of me and hit record.
Over the next few days I continued to work on my 3am dream song, honing the chorus and creating a verse for it. I kept recording each evolution of the song until I felt I had a complete version to work on. Now all I needed were some lyrics. Nothing seemed to spring out at me. After awhile I put the song to the side. I needed to come up with a title. A good title might trigger something but there was no title in sight. It might take years to get this written, which is usually the case with me.
I knew there was something special about this song and I didn’t want to write just anything to get it finished. No, this one had to have the right lyrics. I couldn’t settle. If only I could find a title. It’s odd, but the 1st song that I wrote from hearing it in a dream got its title from watching a movie. Something was said that caught my ear and once I realized it would make a good title for my song, I was set. As I said, it’s odd because the same thing happened with Day of Reckoning.
I was trying to find something to watch on TV and happened to come upon Tombstone with Kurt Russell as Wyatt Earp and Val Kilmer as Doc Holiday. Now I’d seen this movie quite a few times but for some reason I decided to watch a bit. The movie was towards the end when Wyatt goes after the Cowboys who killed his brother with his posse of Doc and 2 other guys. Wyatt’s just heroically fought and killed one of the leaders after being ambushed. They’ve set up camp for the night and Doc is talking with the other deputies, who can’t believe what they saw earlier. At this point Doc looks at them and says “there’s gonna be a RECKONING”.
I heard the word RECKONING and immediately thought of my dream song. It needed to be about a RECKONING!! What was a RECKONING??? Here’s one definition: “a time when somebody’s actions will be judged to be right or wrong and they may be punished. In the final reckoning truth is rewarded”. That sounds like Judgement Day to me and I started to write some lyrics with that in mind. But they sat there for a few years as I moved on to other songs. And then Covid came along. This might be the time to revisit the RECKONING song. But I knew I wasn’t going to write it.
So, I reached out to my friend Jay Friedman. I knew she had been a teacher so she might be good with words. I sent her a text and asked her if she would be interested in writing a song together. She replied “sure”. She had just started to try her hand at writing songs, so she was up for the opportunity. I told her the title was something like My Reckoning or Day of Reckoning. I wasn’t sure but the song had to be about a RECKONING. I sent her an MP3 of the music to give her something to write to and Jay jumped right in. The next day she sent me the 1st verse. I read it in disbelief…it was amazing! I didn’t need to change a word of it! The chorus…not so much. But there were ideas I could latch onto like being haunted by the past. I told her to move onto the 2nd verse, and once again, Jay delivered a bullseye!
I knew the chorus had to deliver the final payoff. In my previous lyrics I had the word “beckoning” rhyming with “reckoning” and I knew I had to keep that! It was the start of the chorus that was holding things up. I kept singing “I try and try” every time I would play it and I thought why not go with it? Once I did the chorus began to fall into place. With some of Jay’s bits and pieces, I was able to mold the chorus together and finish the song. I demoed the song and sent it to Jay to sing a harmony on it and we had Day of Reckoning ready to rock!
January 2022 I was in Shorefire Studios with drummer Steve Holley and bassist Paul Page cutting the basic track. I had sent them a Fleetwood Mac track called Say You Love Me to use as a basis for the groove I was going for. For some reason, the way I played the opening G chord reminded me of Christine McVie’s song. I added a mandolin and a 12-string and had Jay and her husband Tom Wise come down to the studio to do some work. Jay did her harmony vocals on Day of Reckoning. Then she and Tom joined me for some background oohs on another track and Tom brought his bass to play on a new track I had recently recorded. It was a fun day getting together and putting the finished touches on our song. Or so I thought.
I felt that Day of Reckoning was like the lynch-pin for what would become the AmeriKarma album. But something was bothering me about the track. It needed something else, and I wasn’t quite sure what it was. One day I came into to do some work and Shorefire owner & engineer Joe DeMaio mentioned that Tony Trischka has been in recently for a session. Joe thought he could hear a banjo on one of my songs and it wasn’t Day of Reckoning! But as soon as Joe said Tony’s name, I knew he could finish DOR for me. I had been thinking about a banjo for the song because Lindsay Buckingham had played one on Say You Love Me.
A couple of days later I called Joe to have him call Tony for me. Tony was on the road so Joe gave me his number. I called Tony and he said he would call me back in a couple of days when he was back home. But I couldn’t let him off until I told him that I’ve known him for like 50 years and yet we never met. Tony was intrigued and wanted to hear more. I mentioned the bluegrass band he was in called Country Granola in Syracuse NY. I told him I probably stayed in his room one weekend when I came up to Syracuse to record with my college band Trilogy. Tony had just left Granola to join Breakfast Special, which would be the band that would make him famous. Once I mentioned Herb-O, the leader of Country Granola, Tony was hooked. We talked for another 20 minutes before he hung up.
For those of you who have not heard of Tony Trischka, he’s considered to be one of the top banjo players in the world. Not only that but he taught one of the other top banjo players, Bela Fleck. Tony’s been called “the father of modern bluegrass” by the New York Times! I did relate to Tony, in my next phone call to book him for the session, that we might have met at a gig at Indiana University in PA back in ‘73. We were opening for Country Granola and Breakfast Special and this was the 1st time that the guys in Granola had seen Tony since he left the band. It was a crazy night with a wild party after the gig, so my memory of meeting him might not be all there. 🙂
The following week Tony came down for the session and I even brought my banjo with me that I bought in the 70s to show him because I wanted to see if he could tell me about it. It’s an Epiphone banjo that looked like it was made by Gibson when they owned Epiphone. He played it and liked its tone and showed me a few things about the bridge. Then he proceeded to play some incredible stuff on 2 of my songs. It was his suggestion that he play double time at the end of Day of Reckoning and that really makes the track. Tony is a consummate professional and having him play on one of my sessions was a highlight on AmeriKarma. I know Jay was thrilled when she heard that Tony would be playing on our song because she’s in a bluegrass band called Blue Plate Special and everyone knows Tony.
Day of Reckoning was just a dream of a song that became reality in the most magical way possible. The rest, as they say, is history. 🙂