Watch the Awesome Video by BlueCafeMusic.com on YouTube: Help People Up video
The lead song in The Virtualistics was the last one written of the virtual octet during the pandemic lockdowns (May 2020 - May 2021). I wrote HPU for @JoeBiden and @VP Kamala Harris in late January right after they were inaugurated. I wanted something joyous, something to fit the mood of the country and the good news after a year of virus and years of political strife. And I wanted it funky right from the first note, from the shoutout “We the People” (an homage to Biden), to the overlapping funky bridges and cascading vocals in the outros. There are only a few words in the song: Help people up, give people hope, feed people love, everyday. It’s meant to be simple. It’s meant to be sung along with. I want you to sing the lyrics because they are the message that should be tattoo’d inside our brains.
And the track is smokin’. To my ears it sounds like the Neville Brothers especially with Jon’s amazing bass work, but there are elements of Sly and the Family Stone (especially the group-chanting of lyrics), Dr. John’s funky cannon, the Rolling Stones, Talking Heads, and many more. Chana sings down in my register so we can get that mantra effect while Mikaela creates sparks along the top of the entire song - she is becoming more and more powerful with every session. Jon plays bass, guitars, organ, percussion, and lead guitars. As we get into the final bars, he turns it into this tight-knit outro with a pulsating bass and butt-wiggling congas. It simmers and cooks for awhile with my treble guitar accents and then the voice-over: We Believe…. in the People. I love it. Welcome to The Virtualistics, an LP with verve.
Remember, we never met, nor really discussed this wonderful song. But listen to the track. The sound is amazing as Jon masters the boards and you’ll hear this distinct sound throughout the LP. There’s a crispness, an audible sense of being in the front row of a concert. Jon is in control of your ears. Who could tell that the majority of the arrangement and structure was assembled up in a vineyard studio shack, alone and isolated while a virus hunted the streets, methodically writing and recording tracks, only to Dropbox it on to Jon as my working Logic file and hope for the best. Sending your hard-written songs off to your producer is like standing naked out in public. Producers hear it all, all the mistakes, all the off- key attempts to sound like someone else, and the entire world of mouth noises.
Throughout the LP I mic’d the guitars and recorded with a studio amp in an attempt to give it that live sound, complete with studio flooding. Chana and Mikaela sent in snips of vocals and I voice-recorded um-teen tracks for Jon to choose from and assemble. This was all on a simple USB mic, and in Chana’s case, a spare bedroom and a homemade sound box to sing into. It must of taken a solid day for Jon to rid our home recordings’ artifacts.
Help people up, give people hope, feed people love, everyday. What a great message. I saw the phrase Help people up about a year ago in some news article and wrote it down saying that’s a good song. Months later as I played the first riff up in the studio and said “Hey that’s hip,” the words dropped right into place.
For 2021 there is no better visual message in the world than BlueCafeMusic’s amazing HPU video now on YouTube: this world needs love, lots and lots of love to survive. That’s been the songwriter’s job for decades: to make you remember that simple message in your brain with a few well-placed funk riffs.
Jon Ireson, Producer, says:
“Help People Up was the last track sent to me to produce but it was clear that it had to be put out front. In the last 6 months, we're all starting to feel the weight lift off our shoulders and this song reflected that. Getting back to uniting and helping not dividing and fighting. Small acts of kindness every day. Patrick's basic track had the spirit of those classic funk/soul mantras from the late '60s and '70s. I took his James Brown funk chord guitar, brought it right up to the front and added some complementary lines. Then I went after the family band vibe of upbeat layered percussion to get some movement in your feet. We knew it had to be all tied together by a punchy bassline. A little organ for some gospel gravitas. As always Chana and Mikaela lend a great spirit to the record, giving the tune an uplifting push.”
Help People Up
© 2021 by Patrick Ames. All Rights Reserved.
We the people/ My feet know this song
1. Help People Up
2. Give People Hope
3. Feed People Love
Every Day
Help People Up
Give People Hope
Feed People Love
Everyday
Do it now now
All Good Now Now
We believe in the people