Singled Out: Rory Taillon's Welcome

Michael Angulia | 06-25-2020

Ottawa-based singer/songwriter Rory Taillon has released his new album "Drifting" and to celebrate we asked Rory to tell us about the song "Welcome". Here is the story:

Welcome started as a basic riff with a lone verse years ago while I was trying to work through the idea of dealing with my own struggles with mental health by imagery in songwriting. I felt like my personality was split between the person I was normally and the person who was consumed by the darkness. It felt nice to let the "darkness" take over instead of fighting it, but it was really easy to see how unhealthy it was not only for myself, but for my relationships when looking back on the times I let it take the reins.

The song never went anywhere when I originally wrote it until one night last year I was a little bored and could feel the mental health habits creeping in. I set up my loop pedal and started building layers through guitar parts, percussion and heavily stacked vocal harmonies. I eventually ended up at the loop combination that is now at the climax of the final song and turned it up really loud and sat in it. My wife had come home later and I was laying on the floor in the dark with this heavily layered loop playing. I told her I thought I had something that was different for me sonically and she said it had been a long time since she had seen me that happy and excited with something that I had written.

Welcome was the first song off of my album that was written and it set the tone for the writing of the rest of the album. I became more concerned about the vibe and strength of the song over writing something that fit a certain format or that relied heavily on the size of my voice.

When I sat down to record this with audio engineer and producer Dean Watson and co-producer Theo Posthumus I could see they were unsure what I was working towards when we started to build the layers in the studio. Once I created the foundation of what I was thinking, it became a really fun idea collaboration between all of us to add to the vibe and feel of the song. This song is the first single off of my new album Drifting that was released May 16th, 2020.

Hearing is believing. Now that you know the story behind the song, listen and watch for yourself right here!