Letter to my Ex: The Story Behind the Music

(c) 2004 Words, Music and Arrangement by Dave Caruso
Produced by Remy Lambert and Dave Caruso at Rembrant studios, Allen Park, MI, 2004.

The Musicians
Dave Caruso: Lead Vocal, Backing Vocals
Remy Lambert: Electric Guitars
Jake Tobias: Bass, Electric Guitars
Chris Wietzke: Drums

From the CD Single: "Elizabeth Parker"

True Fiction
I get asked a lot if "Letter to my Ex" is a true story. Most of my writing has at least some basis in my own experience, but I usually blend it with my observations of other people and things.

The feelings that motivated me to write the title definitely sprung from my own divorce. After coming up with the title, I decided that the song would be more universally appealing if I treated the "ex" as a past lover, and not specifically an ex-wife.

I wasn't interested in writing about the particulars of my marriage, our breakup, or any message that I secretly wanted my ex-wife to read. I only wanted to deal with a person's feelings, some of them mine, during the process of a breakup. For inspiration, I relied on three of my own stages of grief: denial, anger, and (eventually) acceptance. To complete the lyric, I'd have to create a character using those feelings, find the traits that might be interesting to other people, then add to (or take away from) the storyline to make it as interesting as possible.

In order for the lyric to immediately appear as a letter when read, I borrowed a device from one of the favorite authors of my childhood: Edgar Allan Poe. I loved Poe for his short stories, his gothic writing style, his surprise endings, his detective narratives (he's considered by many to be the father of the modern detective story) and his poetry. As a young boy, I also liked the fact that we share the same middle name, although I spell mine "Allen." Anyway, Poe wrote a few poems with the title, "To --." I found that fascinating, because I felt it implied that either a) he was writing to a particular person, but didn't want to reveal that person's name, or b) he realized that by omitting the person's name, the poem would be more accessible to more people. For my own song, I went for accessibility by using "Dear --" the way Poe used "To --."

A running theme in some of my songs is a conscious reference to the process of solving a puzzle (in other words, of writing). This particular song is a letter, with the main character writing down his thoughts to help make better sense of them.

One thing I did have in common with the main character is the fact that the breakup wasn't his choice. I started my character out with a sinking feeling that he was on the losing end of this deal:

This last couplet could be read two ways: 1) He's being treated badly and knows it, and therefore wants some different advice than he's been getting from his ex-lover, or 2) He's sarcastically telling his ex that he likes the mixed signals she sends.

Next is a reference to the letter itself. It sounds as if the letter's been written many times:

There's a hint as to why he keeps re-writing the letter. As he writes, he's not sure how it's all going to turn out. The letter and the song are symbols for his unresolved relationship and his lack of closure.

He has questions, and you might get the impression that some of these questions are being voiced and answered through his own subconscious thoughts. To accentuate this, I double-tracked those vocal lines on the recording.

This is about recognizing and accepting that the relationship is over, and that it's time to move on.

I recently listened to Michael J. Fox's audio book, "Lucky Man: A Memoir." I really enjoyed it. At one point, Michael uses the phrase "the winter of our disconnect," which the Internet confirms for me is a twist on a line from Shakespeare's "Richard III," and also the title of a book by John Steinbeck. I took this amazing turn of the original phrase and added "Starved in...." to the front of it, in homage to a favorite line from Elton John and Bernie Taupin's autobiographical ode, "Captain Fantastic and The Brown Dirt Cowboy."*** I already had a line for this part of the chorus from chorus 1 but I enjoy adding layers of meaning over repetitive melody lines while keeping the same rhyme so that it's easy for the listener to sing and remember.

In the last chorus, I wanted to do a vocal round, for the feeling of leaving an emotional spiral. The chords change slightly, landing repeatedly on an unusual sound, while the melody becomes stuck for a moment. Then, as the main character starts to see the light at the end of the tunnel, the melody becomes "unstuck," creating closure for the letter, the song, and the situation with the words "This is the end."

That last line was originally "pain is a prick where love infects." I've always had a rebellious streak, and I wanted this line to sting. I used a word that would be forbidden in radio, in a challenge that the usage (as in the prick of a needle) would allow it to get through. Ultimately, I discovered "pain is a bitch if left unchecked," and decided that the new line was shocking enough, a little less forbidding, and more successful in getting the feeling across.

***(Bernie Taupin's line went: "For there's weak winged young sparrows that starve in the winter." If you're not already familiar with it and you enjoy good lyrics, you should check out the rest of the song. The lyric, melody and arrangement are brilliant. For that matter, music lovers owe it to themselves to own the whole album.)