Greg Jones, Composer, Songwriter

Greg's beautiful ballad, "I'll Be In The Mirror" is, to us, the emotional center of the cd, Last Unforetold Man. Not quite sure how that happened. It wasn't intentional, but it just became apparent at some point.

Greg wrote the song and asked me to sing it about two years before he died. He sent me a demo. After listening to it, awed by the weird beauty of the song, I told him he didn't need anyone else to sing it - his vocal was perfect. He insisted, and I loved the song anyway, so I learned it and we recorded it several times over the next couple of years.

Greg was not just an extremely talented composer and songwriter, he was a friend, the kind of best friend a man can have ... you know the old saying "A good friend will help you move. A best friend will help you move a body" ... Greg was that kind of friend. We met in the early eighties after he ran an ad for "Synthesizer Studio For Rent" in the SF Bay Guardian. $10/hr. he charged ... I never hired him for studio time, but we became fast friends starting then. He was just married. I was a new father myself. Within a few years we would both have two children and his son and my sons were good friends.

So long ago. Some good times.

Greg was, I believe, the first person to use Alan Lomax's field recordings of black folk, blues, and gospel music mixed in with modern instrumentation. You can hear five of his early songs on the movie, "The General's Daughter" soundtrack ... the backwards banjo which is the first thing you hear in the movie, from the song "Sea Lion Song," was a suggestion from yours truly, mostly because I can't stand banjos. Greg played the song for me. It had a regular banjo part. I said,"Turn the banjo backwards." He flipped the file in the music program he was using. Backwards banjo instantamento ... it was perfect ... we happily agreed that backwards always works, except when it doesn't.

The suggestion, and the fact that he used it, remains the crowning achievement of my life so far. That and a pop-fly I caught in little league one year.

Anyway, Greg went on to do some other film music, but the kind of success achieved by Moby, who was emulating the use of the Lomax field recordings a couple years later on "Play," eluded Greg. He was all art, no self-promotional skills. 

We would bitch and moan about Moby, of course, but after a while we both had to admit how good Moby was/is.

About five years ago, Greg asked if I wanted to sing "I'll Be In The Mirror." I was more than flattered, so in awe I had always been of his talent. He emailed me an mp3 and faxed the lyric sheet with the chords ... of course it was in some weird key like F-sharp minor and was a bastard to sing and play ... but I learned it as best i could. When I got down to LA a few months later, one of the first things we did together was record the song in his studio.

My voice coach heard anger in the song and wanted me to find a personalization that would bring that emotion to the fore ... you know, sing to some girlfriend that had dumped me or something.

But Greg wanted me to sing it as softly and as tenderly as I could. I didn't understand, and I found it hard to shift emotional gears ... like I think great actors and singers can do ... but i tried.

We recorded it a couple times over the next year trying to get it right.

I thought he did a great vocal for it, but he was quite insecure about his voice. (You can hear him sing "Oh please don't go" in the first verse of the song.)

Greg had battled depression for many years. And I knew he would go into some very dark places at times, but the past few years, his [personal] music had lightened up, the lyrics weren't so dark, and I thought he was out of the woods. He would get stressed out at times, but that's just part of life.

I went to Spiderman 2 with him back in July of 2004 and he was acting kind of odd. He was worried about money. After the movie, I wanted to go eat, but he wanted to get home. So I drove him to his house in Silverlake and said goodnight.

I don't remember if we spoke again. I called the house about a week later to tell him some news and his girlfriend informed me that he had hung himself that morning.

My dear friend, my brother, Greg Jones was dead.

In the months that followed, as the shock and pain wore off, I would sing his song "I'll Be In The Mirror," and the lyrics took on new meaning over time.

The arrangement I've posted is music he made, pitch-shifted, processed somewhat by me, with a couple sound FX thrown in. But I hope I am getting close to the tenderness he wanted for the song in my singing.

I sing it to him now.

Is it my imagination, or was this song an intentional goodbye note written almost two years before he left us? You may read the lyrics below and decide.

I'll Be In The Mirror

Well, you didn't see it coming
So how were you to know
That there would be a situation
(Oh please don't go)

How could you turn your face away?
Study some picture on the wall?
Trying to find your way back
Back to the way it was before

I'll be home some day
You won't be on your own
I'll be in the mirror
You won't be alone

Down the center of the railway
And you're singing in your sleep
Driving down the sidewalk
Strolling on the 405
Down the center of the railway
Singing in your sleep

Trying to find your way back
Back to the way it was before

And when the moon arises
You park high upon the hill
And the city spreads beneath you
Like a carpet made of pearls
And you don't want to know the reason
You just want it to go on and on
on and on on and on

you don't want to know the reason
You just want it to go on and on
on and on on and on
you don't want to know the reason
You just want it to go

on and on

on and on

on and on

Copyright 2002 by Greg Hale Jones