Favour Is Life
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Lyrics
[0:00–0:22 — FIRST PASS / NIGHT STILL HANGING ON] Psalm thirty, five, eleven through twelve. For his anger endureth but a moment; in his favour is life: weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning. Thou hast turned for me my mourning into dancing: thou hast put off my sackcloth, and girded me with gladness; To the end that my glory may sing praise to thee, and not be silent. O LORD my God, I will give thanks unto thee for ever. [Start with dry phone-mic tenor, faint road hiss, one low Rhodes chord, soft sub pulse and distant clean electric guitar shimmer. No full drums yet. Let “weeping may endure for a night” sound genuinely worn, almost like the singer has driven through the whole night. Keep “but joy cometh in the morning” restrained at first—hope showing up, not a giant sunrise.] [0:23–1:00 — SECOND PASS / FIRST LIGHT HITS THE WINDSHIELD] Psalm chapter thirty, verse five, and verses eleven through twelve. For his anger endureth but a moment; in his favour is life: weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning. Thou hast turned for me my mourning into dancing: thou hast put off my sackcloth, and girded me with gladness; To the end that my glory may sing praise to thee, and not be silent. O LORD my God, I will give thanks unto thee for ever. [Bring in dusty boom-bap drums, cracked snare, warm bass guitar, soft sub and wide chorus-soaked electric guitars. Keep the pocket low and nocturnal through “weeping may endure.”] [LEAD] Weeping may endure for a night— [BEAT CUT] But joy cometh in the morning. [ROUGH OFF-MIC VOICE] Morning. [ALT-ROCK MICROBURST: one bright overdriven guitar bloom opens wide for two seconds, then disappears back into the dusty groove.] [LEAD] Thou hast turned for me my mourning— [MICRO-SILENCE] Into dancing. [ONE ROUGH VOICE] Dancing. [Do not turn it into a chant.] [1:01–1:34 — INTERLUDE / MOURNING STARTS MOVING] Ooh. Yeah. Thou hast put off my sackcloth, and girded me with gladness. [Let the bassline loosen and start moving more. Add muted guitar scratches, rough back-seat “oohs,” one crooked clap and faint road ambience.] [PSYCHEDELIC MICROBURST: reverse a clean guitar tail so it briefly seems to pull the song backward into the night, then snap forward.] Girded me with gladness. [ACOUSTIC MICROBURST: one tiny bright fingerpicked acoustic lick after “gladness,” barely one second, then gone.] To the end that my glory may sing praise to thee— [DRUMS THIN] And not be silent. [Let “not be silent” get one quick gritty upward tenor run, imperfect and human.] [1:35–2:20 — THIRD PASS / SUNRISE WITHOUT POLISH] The book of Psalms, Psalm thirty, verse five, and verses eleven through twelve. For his anger endureth but a moment; in his favour is life: weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning. Thou hast turned for me my mourning into dancing: thou hast put off my sackcloth, and girded me with gladness; To the end that my glory may sing praise to thee, and not be silent. O LORD my God, I will give thanks unto thee for ever. [Start with bass guitar and close lead only. Let the boom-bap drums return piece by piece. Bring the widest clean guitars of the song underneath “joy cometh in the morning.” Keep everything raw and slightly loose.] [LEAD] Weeping may endure for a night. [ONE LOW VOICE] For a night. [LEAD] But joy cometh in the morning. [ROUGH CREW — ONE WARM, UNEVEN DOUBLE] Joy cometh in the morning. [Cut them immediately.] Thou hast turned for me my mourning into dancing. [SHORT GUITAR SURGE: gritty alt-rock riff blooms for one bar, then disappears.] Thou hast put off my sackcloth, and girded me with gladness. [LEAD — CLOSE AGAIN] To the end that my glory may sing praise to thee, and not be silent. O LORD my God, I will give thanks unto thee for ever. [Let the final line settle rather than explode.] [OUTRO / THE SKY IS CHANGING] Ooh. Yeah. [No more scripture repetition. Let dusty drums, warm bass guitar, wide clean electrics, faint Rhodes and highway ambience keep rolling. One guitar line slowly climbs. One friend hums roughly in the background.] [SECOND ACOUSTIC MICROBURST: tiny warm acoustic flick hidden underneath the final instrumental bars.] [Let a distorted guitar note open wide, then abruptly disappear.] [Hard cut.] [OVERALL VOCAL DIRECTION] [The architecture is NIGHT → MORNING → MOURNING → DANCING → GLADNESS → NOT SILENT → THANKS. This is the emotional sunrise track, but avoid glossy sunrise-CCM production. Male tenor stays dry, grainy, tired-but-opening-up, conversational and slightly behind the beat with restrained imperfect runs. Boom bap remains the spine; alt-rock gradually adds width and catharsis through clean chorus guitars and brief distorted blooms. Rough male friends should sound like people who drove through the night with him—low yeahs, worn oohs, sparse one-time catches. Psychedelia stays tiny: reverse guitar tails, tape bends, warped Rhodes. Acoustic]