I Gave You Lots of Presents (But You Left Me In the Past)
“I Gave You Lots of Presents (But You Left Me In the Past)” is a tale of love long lost. If you’re going to try and buy happiness, remember to keep the receipt. Autoharp, vocals, and a little bit of honky-tonk toy piano.
This arose from a songwriting exercise where you look around you and quickly write song titles based on whatever is lying around. For instance, I’m in the dining room right now, and I see a mug, a telephone, a piano, a ceiling light/fan, and a cat. Okay, so going as fast as I can and thinking as little as possible, I make up the song titles: “I Love Your Mug,” “1-800-THIS-SONG,” “88 Keys That Don’t Open Anything,” “Blow Out the Light,” and “Hey, That’s My Cat.” Obviously, most song titles you get this way will suck. But every now and then you’ll get a good one; one that never would have otherwise occurred to you.
It must have been around Christmas or someone’s birthday when I came up with this one.
Technical details: Let’s see. There’s Autoharp with a split signal panned, unevenly, L-R. Toy piano. Synth bass (Alesis Micron). Combination of real and fake drums (the snare is real; the kick is fake; the cymbals, I think, might be both). One lead vocal and a couple of backups; the backups were recorded bit by bit as I figured parts out. I think that’s it; it’s a pretty simple song.