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The Making of the Album
The band was put together by her making a wishlist of her perfect band and then praying very hard for the courage to ask them. It is a blend of truly superb jazz instrumentalists but with a rockier rhythm section to ensure music you could dance to, seduce someone to or even have great sex to. The rock/punk drummer Dave Barbarossa she met in film writing class, the percussion player Adrian Meehan she hired through a friend turned out to have been an old acquaintance. The awesome Steve Waterman on trumpet and Russell van der Berg on sax were teachers of hers from Wavingdon jazz school who had been very patient with her! John McKenzie on bass was hired just before the session though she had last seen him play 4 years before. The cellist is Amy Lindsay Barry Green on piano Marysia first met at a Marian Montgomery performance course she had done years before. Myles Kayne on guitar has been working with Marysia on various dance music projects and jazz gigs. They met through the dance music producer Michael Skins. Marysia asked Michael to co-produce in the week of recording and on the edit given his amazing ears and sheer niceness! Given his additional former careers as a reggae drummer and percussionist he also played when the mood took him. Marysia was given a huge amount of help, advice and sheer love by everyone. Even finding the right studio was hard, given so few places are able to understand this kind of recording without killing the budget. The man who suggested we put the drummer in a drafty corridor down the hall will be left unmentioned. Before the week of recording the 15 tracks (now down to 14 on the album) the musicians who, for the most part, had never even met let alone rehearsed, were sent a mix of parts, a CD of tracks and musical arrangements. Given the experience and brilliance of all the musicians it was great to see how everyone checked in their egos at the door and to put it plainly made beautiful music together. At the end of the 5 days Amy on cello was brought in to overdub (the drummer was so loud it would have been impossible to record her live) as well as Maria Davis, a great jazz singer and personal friend of Marysia's came in to do backing vocals on 2 tunes. Marysia is just mixing the album in the Studio at the Sunset Marquee hotel, Tom Fritz who previously worked at the Hit Factory in New York is the engineer working against a tight deadline and tighter budget. The album cover has been designed by Martin Butterworth who is a fan, and more importantly a film/record/poster designer. The web site has been put together and designed by JM Littman, who has a Web Design Company If You Can't Make Love Make Coffee - the album title was suggested non other than, Jerry Leiber as of Hound Dog, Stand By Me Fame etc..
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Marysia realised the only way she would be able to make the album she dreamed of was to do it herself to ensure full creative control. She wrote the album in her home studio, 4 of them being co-written. "Goodbye" is the exception as it is a long existing tune of Steve Waterman, which Marysia then wrote lyrics to.
