“Wazey” by Madame Gandhi

https://soundcloud.com/madamegandhi/wazey/

Wazey is the first song I have ever written. It started with me singing a drum beat, which my producer and I ended up chopping up and using as the main vocal sample heard throughout the track. It was inspired by a beat I had heard from a record from Mali, but in the track itself evolves quite from my initial inspiration (Konono No. 1 – T.P. Couleur Café – 2005).

Anthony Saffery, formerly of Cornershop, sitar player for Beck and recent producer on 3 of Portugal The Man’s albums, helped me produce this track.

I would work at Spotify in Boston all summer, and then bike over to his studio after work to write lyrics, lay drum beats and record. His kids, Oliver and Ruby, would pop in occasionally and contribute amazing ideas. In fact, Oliver is working on a remix of Wazey now. On Mondays, we’d all go to taco night at Cuisine En Locale, the restaurant that his wife and my hero JJ Gonson owns.

The track is called Wazey because it is about finding your way. I had been in Brazil a few months earlier, and taxi drivers in Sao Paolo all use the Waze app, but pronounce it “Wazey”! I had been studying Portuguese for a year, and love its flows, its rhythms, the tenderness infused in the language, so so much. It inspired me, and I named the track “Wazey”.

As a drummer, vocals are new to me, so I wanted to make sure the track featured what I do best. Drum. During the “I love you” break downs, you will hear 3 different layered beats I created: 1) vocal beat boxing, 2) electronic midi notes created with Sensory Percussion Technology and 3) real drums that I recorded live at Jamspot Studios in Boston.

In the track, I sing about love, nostalgia, memories all the while recognizing how crazy that can make you, and how important it is to identify what makes you happy, as an individual, and doing everything you can to get back to that place. Hence the last line in the track, “basking naked where the sunrays hit me.” My name means ray of sunlight, and I had spent the summer trying to return to my own light, and the things that make me happy in the rawest, and most naked sense.

Both Smash’d (Troy Carter / Atom Factory’s content platform for music and tech) and Music & Other Drugs covered the song! Producer James Kelly and artist Satya Valli remixed the track.

“Wazey” has been licensed for Refinery 29’s Femshop.com Video and Paul Fischer’s Enablers Podcast in London.

Below, you will find the lyrics to both Wazey, as well as the remixed verse by the homie Satya.

“Wazey” by Madame Gandhi

https://soundcloud.com/madamegandhi/wazey/

[VERSE 1]

Take me up

Oooh take me up

Oooh take me up

Where your mine

where we’re free

all I see is lost in green

and my core breathing fantasy

And ooh take me up

to that place

to your mind

where my thoughts get caught in time

and my soul’s calmest light

can sleep soundly through the night

[CHORUS]

If I drum the beat

Will you sing with me?

x3

[BRIDGE]

I love you

x3

[VERSE 2]

Bring me back

Oooh bring me back

(in the wake of all this time, in the wake of all that’s happened)

Oooh bring me back

Where we’re there

coastal air

running twenty by the sea

and my legs dancing wildly

But nostalgic thoughts make a young babe crazy

(giggle)

(a yellow sea around me)

When I get lost I just turn on Wazey

She always knows which way to take me

Basking naked where the sun rays hit me

(A yellow sea around me)

Wazey…vamos-la!

[CHORUS]

If I drum the beat

Will you sing with me?

x3

A yellow sea around me

A yellow sea around me

A yellow sea around me

[DRUM SOLO]

[ACAPELLA OUTRO]

https://soundcloud.com/satyavalli/wazey-ft-satya

“Wazey” (Remix feat. Satya) by Madame Gandhi

Take me away to the places, back to home bases is what I am dying to be

dying to see, maybe my feet are just dying to bleed, but im trying to see

I can not smile then light up a tree, christmas for me when I light up the tree

fire will feed the distance in you and me, it might just not ruin me yet…

live life direct, and connect to reflect, and then follow the breath and catch the next 4, when im off beat will you show me the door, when i’m off beat will you show me the door.

spirit that soar line feminine, truth to swallow like cinnamon, imminent tell time we meet

ironic that it is

gone with the wind while i’m blowing my kisses

my words will not land if you don’t stand to witness

take me to freedom, taste so delishious

give you a reason,to call me ambitious

let us be free, we can not miss it