Words and music by Transfer Point

I think maybe this time
The pressure is starting to grow
You keep it inside you,
Hoping not to let it show
The weight of the world
In the sum of your mistakes
But hand it over
And see the difference that it makes

You say that the spotlight
Is hot enough to burn your skin
The shame of your errors –
It seems like you’ll never win
After all you can do
The pain that remains in your heart
If you hand it over,
You can let the healing start

When you climb the highest mountain
And you feel you’ve lost the trail,
Just tell your feet to keep climbing
You have come too far to fail
If you don’t give in,
You know that you can win

It seems that forever –
A hard perspective to see
With myopic sight
And lack of harmony
When the only sight we see
Is just in front of our face
This time hand it over
Until the pieces fall in place

When you climb the highest mountain
And you found you’ve lost the trail,
Just tell your feet to keep climbing
You have come too far to fail
If you don’t give in,
You know that you can win

Tom Sanderson: lead vocals, keyboards, drums
Alan Sanderson: guitar, bass, backing vocals, keyboards, mixing, mastering, cover art

Tom’s Notes

In August, 2024 I was asked to participate in a local church talent show by preparing a musical number. Since I felt inadequate in my performance skills, I decided to prepare a keyboard sequence to use as a backing track to play a top keyboard line over and a guitar solo. This would help me not feel so exposed on stage. And so I started with a drum loop and a looped keyboard line that I intended to play over.

Lately, I have been having trouble initiating creating music and it was refreshing that a deadline made the music flow with little resistance. The loop went on and on for several bars – I didn’t really have a structure in mind initially. I started a new pattern/section with a different synth patch playing 8th note arpeggios. This segment took a bit more conscious effort to figure out as it had a few modulations. I finally had a rough sequence with a lot of redundancy in the “A” section for solos.

Since this performance was mostly for church-goers, I thought it appropriate that the message of the lyrics should be more positive than some of my latest offerings. I will not dissect the words here but I think they could be speaking about hope, grace, persistence and also resisting apathy. I have struggled with the meaning of grace, especially during my adolescence where I felt with acuity the cognitive dissonance of falling short of my value system. Maybe a good summary is: just keep trying.

I was asked to perform a couple of cover songs by the band Weezer with some other church friends at the talent show, so I was off the hook for a solo number. This meant, however, I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do with this song at first. I shared the rough sequence with Alan and my brother Brian. Both offered some positive feedback and Alan actually had some ideas for guitar and bass. I recorded a rough version with a vocal but I lost momentum in the project. In the meantime I finished up “Adventures in Journalism” and then Alan and I worked on “A Lonely Serenade.”

When Alan and I finished “A Lonely Serenade,” I tried to come up with a foundation for another project. I had several fragments but had considerable difficulty developing any of them. Alan then suggested working on “Hand It Over.” I agreed, happy to have his help in finishing the recording. I think a positive effect of us working together is creating something that is even more unique from the collective influences for each song/composition. Our different approaches to a given project helps to smooth out spots that might sound a bit too close to the music that inspired the tune.

Alan provided great texture with his guitar work and expanded the simple chords in the verses. I love his pentatonic work in the early guitar solos. He spent a bit of time dialing in the right tone for his Telecaster. I like the muddy tone he got on his bass and the altering from the root in the verses to a baritone counter-melody in the chorus. He also provided a great harmony vocal, backing vocals and ambient keyboard work. Alan has done almost all of the mixing on our projects and has done a really solid job here. He was instrumental in reducing the many redundant measures I had created down to the essential structure.

It took me quite a few attempts to get the vocal finished. I think I’ve concluded that it is more a matter of a more difficult melody to sing than a set of aging vocal cords. I’ll let you adjudicate the matter.

Alan’s Notes

I really liked Tom’s keyboard sequence and could hear guitar and bass melodies for it right away. Then when he sent his vocal part a few weeks later I was doubly impressed. This song really moves, and it is the vocal part that propels it forward, with great syncopated hooks and really positive lyrics.

The guitar sound I was aiming for was Andy Summers, from The Police. I don’t think I quite hit Summers, although the third verse was where I really tried to reach for him. This was definitely a Telecaster song. I decided to use the MOD Dwarf rather than effects in the DAW. The device’s default pedalboard, called “A Warm Welcome,” has a lovely shimmer reverb and echo delay. This gave the guitar a sound that was something closer to The Edge, guitarist from U2. I added a chorus effect in parallel — although I’m not totally sure why I didn’t just put it in series. I didn’t have the amp and cabinet or tremolo plugins on the pedalboard enabled. Here is a screenshot:

I ran the stereo output to two different amplifiers: my trusty old Crate GX-30M and my Fender Dual Showman running through a Fender cabinet.

Peter Hook from New Order was my inspiration for the bass guitar part, which is definitely in a post-punk style. With the keyboards, guitar, and bass parts all harking back to the 1980’s, it seemed reasonable to go a little overboard on the reverb and echo in the mixing and mastering.

I am really pleased with the final result of this collaborative effort. It is a lot of fun to go deep in contributing to a project that I know I would never have had the inspiration to make all by myself.

Info and Stats

• Production Dates: August 2024 — February 2025
• Equipment:
  • Interfaces: Behringer Xenyx 1204USB, Behringer Ultra-DI DI400P, Tascam DSP24SD, MOD Dwarf Founders Edition
  • Synths: Roland FA-06, Yamaha Reface CS
  • Guitars and Basses: Fender Telecaster, Ibanez ASB140 bass
  • Amplifiers and Speakers: Fender Dual showman, Crate GX-30M, Fender 12×2 cabinet
  • Microphones: Audio Technica AT2035 Condenser Microphone (with wrap-around PopFilter), DIY condenser by Michael Willis, Shure SM-57, Samson R21
• Software:
  • Linux Mint 20.2
  • Ardour 8.10.0
  • Dragonfly Reverb: Room, Plate
  • x42-plugins: parametric equalizer, dynamic compressor, digital peak limiter
  • Calf Studio Gear: vintage delay, flanger, bass enhancer
  • TAP: AutoPanner
  • On the MOD Dwarf: Shiroverb, Phantom Zone, Modulay
• Total Tracks: 24
  • vocal: 14
  • keyboards: 6
  • guitars and basses: 2
  • drums: 2