This is “Happy to be Here Diane”.

We’re an indie duo from Brazil writing little songs. This is our newsletter, in which we’re going to each write little thoughts about everything and anything.

This is our second EP, “The Guest Room Floor”, available pretty much everywhere. It is cool.

“Waltz #3 (Everything Above the Earth) is incredibly important to me. An old composition, it is a deeply personal song and the one I indulged myself to be the most severe about how I wanted it to sound.

The name is an Elliott Smith reference, both as an act of devotion in that he already has the first two Waltz songs, but also named like this in a desire from 20s me to write like my idol. Also about the name, this song had a lot of them, but I ended in “Waltz #3 (Everything Under the Moon)". We decided to give the song a slightly different name to differentiate my old recordings of this one alone. This is HTBHD’s version, with Leandro’s percussion.

I could talk a good deal more about this one, but I wanted to tell a (hopefully) little story. When I was in College, deeply depressed out of my mind, I had a class in which I had to do a recording in their professional studio. I decided to record this one song. I booked a time in the morning with Sound Guy. I thought I was going to be alone in the studio, so when my usual insomnia made me wake up two hours late from the agreed time, I went to college with my usual head and my electric guitar. Getting there, Sound Guy was so pissed. He was to operate the studio, actually, and I fucked up. I stood him up hard. How I was in the time, I had almost a panic attack, deep shame filled me up. Breathing went shallow. When we got to the studio, Sound Guy, still pissed, told me I better have this shit figured out. I spent a good deal of my night actually composing and practicing the arrangement (the same you hear in our recording) and yeah, I nailed it. With time, listening to the song form easily, Sound Guy recovered his calm. But he jokingly said something I will never forget, listening to the song: “You are not going to kill yourself, are you?” I laughed it off. But deep down, at the time, I actually didn’t know.

This song might sound sad, but I always smile listening to it. I still believe and live by the words in the climatic verse of “Waltz #3 (Everything Above the Earth)”. Even in my darkest days, I did. In every measure of our sadness, there is happiness to be found. I truly hope this is true.

I gotta say: I’ve never met anyone who’s such a hardcore Elliott Smith fan as my buddy JP. I think Elliott Smith is to JP what Los Campesinos! is to me. (Seriously, I love LC!).

Anyway, the first time I ever heard about Elliott was JP playing some random song during one of those guitar circles with friends. Back then, I was totally obsessed with John Frusciante’s solo stuff. Yeah, I know… these days I kinda cringe at that phase because I put him on a pedestal when, honestly, even though he’s really good, I don’t think he was that legendary. That said, The Will To Death is an absolute masterpiece — no debate there.

But hey, that’s probably a topic for another newsletter.

Point is, JP’s such a fan of Elliott that he went and wrote a third Waltz.

Waltz #3 (Everything Above the Earth) was one of the last songs to make it onto the EP. JP was stuck in a creative block, not sure what song to bring in, so he pulled out this track he had already recorded back in college (you guys know the story).

I really love the lyrics on this one—they’ve been hitting me hard lately, resonating with stuff that’s been going on. That opening line always gets me: “Stayed up all night / In the guest room floor / Wondering if this house / Was mine or yours.”

For me, it’s the climax of the EP, my favorite track. I love everything about it — the sound, the lyrics, the arrangement. I think the guitars are some of the most beautiful JP’s ever written. As a drummer first, before being a singer-songwriter, the 3/4 verse over a 4/4 drum beat threw me off at first. But when I asked John if that was intentional and he said, “Yeah, that’s how I recorded it,” I didn’t hesitate—I trusted the idea.