Happily Ever After

(John D. Anderson, James C. Hicks, Sr.) A stirring take on a fairy tale romance, with a haunting melody and brilliant musicality. The melancholy instrumentation juxtapose against the romance of the tender vocal and lyrics.

I like this one a lot. However, I’ve been criticized already on this one, and I don’t know why they can’t put the two together, the melody and the words, it’s like, ‘oh, that’s sad’. It really isn’t sad.

I was playing that melody for my buddy Jim Hicks, he says, ‘what are you doing there?’ I said, ‘nothing.’ He said, ‘no, that’s something’. And it was something. If you break it down and see where it’s all at, yeah, it was something. But I’d have never caught it. There’s no telling how many times before in writing I’ve played something like it, and wrote it off as nothing, because it’s kind of a familiar change there. Except for when it goes off into that little spot, which makes it completely different.

To me, it did sound very ‘fairy tale-ish.’ It’s got a Brothers Grimm aspect to it. This was a great example of where I sat down and played it on guitar very simply, and the players would build and play around it.

The keyboards from Gary Smith on this record are one of the most outstanding parts, and actually Gary ended up joining my band. He ended up passing away the first of December. However this record does or doesn’t do, there will always be a little sadness in it for me knowing this was the last I’ll be working Gary forever.