• Hayley Young

Thomas Hunter: "White China March"

Thomas Hunter: "A Vaguely Pregnant Piece of Nonsense"

Thomas Hunter: "Tinfoil Slip"

Walk me through the coming together of the song “White China March”.

Hunter: I wanted to write an experience song. It's about my lovely wife. And drugs of course. The first little thing sprouted out of the beginning of the Delfonics song, "Baby I Love You," and these Chopin guitar reductions I was working on. I wanted a pretty, classic, Stax-y, Isaac Hayes-ey feel in the verse with the strings and all. I took my time with the colors I was introducing. I wanted to take the build very slow. I know the form seems weird with all the starts and stops and feel changes, but it's what felt natural to me at the time. I wanted the second verse to be kind of like that Kinks tune "Sitting in My Hotel." Then I felt like a huge bridge with Zana from Thee Emergency doing The Dark Side of the Moon thing would be rad, especially if it went into a Zeppelin-y finger-picking thing.

Toward the end I say, "Disappear beyond the bricks and skin some silly God has built us in. When the clock-hand stops my blinded brain and heart begin to love you until the ground coughs up our bones. A pile of teeth will make a home for you and me alone." It's actually a line from my marriage vows. It's really reflective about how strongly I love my wife. She's my partner and my best friend. She's the only person I need in the world and it's us against everyone if it has to be. This is a very personal song to me. I'm really glad you chose this one to preview. It's the first track on the record. I used my beautiful Heritage Eagle for all the guitar tracks. I've spent more time with that instrument than any human being I've ever known, so It felt suiting for such a person tune. I used Phil Peterson’s old Frankenstein late '60's P-bass which has so much old character to it. This one has the amazing Bobby Parker on the trumpet, and some of Kyle O’Quin’s best key work I've ever heard. I close mic'd the fucked up little speaker on Tom Pfaeffle’s old blown out Wurly that’s at the Tank Studios and Kyle decided to absolutely destroy it. We did some super sci-fi theremin tracks at the end also. I’m excited to let people hear it.

Wild Orchid Children play Saturday, October 9th at The Tractor