Hi Wickens - Yes, as I said in my original post, this was actually recorded using my mobile rig outside of all places. In an accidental way its a great example of how untamed frequencies can have undesirable effects on different playback systems unless recorded or mixed correctly. On laptop speakers these sounds are not audible at all, but on my studio monitors I got everything you did, which is basically wind rumble. This is well nigh impossible to get rid of without pulling all the tone out of the rest of the recording too.

As I said, given that, I was taking route one to a workable demo to plan a full recording, ie, only 19 minutes of digital 'tape roll' start to finish. As I was writing out of my usual genre, I was after feedback on the song itself, and that has been very encouraging.

Thanks for commenting.

Garry

Knowing where and how it is recorded helped me overcome the "wind" noise, etc.  Through my monitors it made me jump a couple times.  I TOO AM MORE INTO THE SONGS.  It's probably because I am a less than competent engineer.  I mam fortunate to be teamed with a great engineer (CLEAN).  It is a very nice song and your friend makes it easier to understand that.  Great vocalist.  So, the song is wonderful. 

I think the positive comments that have been made are correct. Good voice, good placement, good homey feeling to the overall song.

What it lacks is something that makes it memorable. I've said this a couple of times today, now I feel like I'm being repetitive.

Her voice is memorable (very karen carpenter), The guitar riffing is slightly memorable, but I don't even know what the lyrics were saying and it felt rushed in certain places.
Overall, the song felt emotionally flat to me. If nothing reminds me of you, but I've got a happy contrast in my delivery then my melody choice should reflect that. I felt like this would be great, if you're already famous, and people really want to know where your heart is on things, but if you're trying to be noticed, this song just wouldn't be the one you'd want to show them as an artist. The song is good, in the sense that it's performed well and has the right ingredients. So this is not a negative of musicianship; I hope you wouldn't take it that way.

Part of this is my journey too. I'm constantly thinking about how I can make something memorable and passionate, but true and not gimmicky. Here's my check list;

• context
• lyrics
• melody
• memorable
• repeatable - staying power - timeless?
• melody hook
• guitar hook
• key
• vocal driven
• guitar driven
• age group
• message

Not saying I think this all through before I write, I'm saying that everything I write gets evaluated by each dynamic before I take it to full production.