While CW was attending Iowa State University in 1987, he took a course in English composition. At one point, he presented his professor with some sheet music he'd been working on for Sound System. His professor told him she liked the lyrics, but that she didn't read music and couldn't comment on that part of the work. She suggested her husband -- a folk musician -- might have more valuable input. CW agreed, and sent the sheets home with Ms. Klassen.
A couple of weeks later, CW received a call from Ms. Klassen's husband, Rob Straughn. Rob had liked the compositions and wanted to hear them, and to hear any more CW had lying around. In addition, Rob suggested he could play some of his own compositions for CW. If things worked out, maybe they could begin composing together.
They met at the Phi Gamma Delta fraternity where CW was living, and walked around campus, talking and playing guitars, for about four hours. The 22-year gap in their ages seemed insignificant -- their musical styles, while different, had common threads and gelled together quite nicely. When they returned to the house, they exchanged some cassettes and agreed to meet the next week to hash out some ideas.
CW and Rob wrote about a dozen songs in the next few months, some of which were to appear on Sound System's still-unreleased A Safe Place album. CW left the university at the end of the second semester, and Rob moved back to his hometown of Madison, Wisconsin. They have continued to get together regularly to compose, record, and discuss music.
Their first commercial recordings together were made in the last few days of 1988. Rob has always had a tendency to write under pseudonyms -- some favorites include robin silde, m. gant, and parke laurel audubon (the lowercase letters are intentional, in the style of e.e. cummings).
CW had the idea, and Rob agreed, to call themselves the audubon society (after parke laurel audubon, not the National Audubon Society), and their first album was named after the duet. CW offered some songs he had written for the audubon society and for Sound System, Rob had some he'd written in recent months, they added some recent and new collaborations, and one written by Sound System's Steve Hudspeth. The result is a rich acoustic tapestry, reminiscent of Simon & Garfunkel, James Taylor, and mid-sixties acoustic Beatles recordings.
the audubon society's second album, Ancient Blue, was recorded in Sound System's / Velvet Picasso's rehearsal space in October 1989. Steve Hudspeth produced the recordings, and Justin Chastain contributed some keyboard parts, for a slightly more complex presentation than on the audubon society.
the audubon society recorded three albums together between 1989 and 1991. As they developed and started experimenting with new styles and sounds, they recorded under other names as well: Left Overs, misunderstanding (1992), and eventually Smith & Straughn (1996 to present).
The early recordings were made on four-track cassettes, and usually very quickly. Often albums like the audubon society and Ackworth were completed in two or three days. Songs would be written from a spark of an idea, arranged, recorded and mixed on the same day, often within mere hours from start to finish.
Later recordings -- since 1996 -- have been much more complex. Songs might be written over the course of weeks or months, trading ideas via the phone, letters, or mailed demo tapes. Recordings are layered laboriously, beginning with live acoustic recordings, and adding percussion and color instruments over weeks, months, or even years. Recently, CW gave Rob an Apple iBook from his collection of old Macs, so he and Rob could send tracks back and forth to one another -- on CD-ROMs or even over the Internet -- and allow recordings to be polished even further.
Their latest CD, still in progress, will be the culmination of ten years' work. Who We Are will show a more acoustic side of CW, and a more electric side of Rob, and will still trace its roots back to that first meeting at Iowa State University in 1987.
Contact CW about his music!
• Contact Rob about his
music!
Home •
Demos •
CW Smith •
Sound System •
Smith & Straughn
Walrus Records •
Trifecta Studio •
Silicon Alley •
WinMacTech
©2006 CW Smith. All rights
reserved. Unauthorized duplication
or distribution of this page or its contents is a violation
of applicable laws.