Fear the Silence: Commentary (by Paul Sehnen)

The music of "Fear the Silence" was inspired in a way by the music of Bruce Springsteen's "Downbound Train" from the Born in the USA album. I was playing the Bruce tune on my guitar, with a capo at the third fret, and found myself thinking that I really liked not only the song but also the sound of the key and position. I set about to write my own song in the same key and position, and after rearranging Bruce's chord sequences, coming up with new rhythm patterns for them, and "Sehnen-izing" some of the chords by adding notes to them, I had the music of "Fear the Silence."

The lyrics of "Fear the Silence" were written for a close associate and friend of mine. The lyrics and delivery were meant to convey my anger over the way her mother's verbal abuse set into motion a chain of reactions from which there had been no recovery. In retrospect I honestly do not remember which came first, the music or the words; as with a number of my songs, the music and the words of FtS probably started out independent of each other, and then came together at some point. At any given time I will have a set of musical ideas waiting for words, and on the other hand a separate set of lyrical ideas waiting for music. Experimentation wll bring together one of each, and a song will be coaxed out of it. Often the final result sounds a bit different than what I had in mind at an earlier stage of the process, but sounds pleasing to me otherwise I would not pronounce it "done." Mix a bit of deliberation with a bit of creative chaos, and you have my current songwriting process.