I have wandered into a rather bad habit. I can not drift off to sleep unless I’m listening to British comedy on TuneIn Radio with one earbud. It was one night, as I was in that weird, ebbing realm just before slumber, that I heard the legendary George Formby singing ‘Our Fanny’s Gone All Yankee’, (first line: “Our Fanny ain’t the girl she used to be…”) and I misheard the lyrics as ‘Myfanwy’, a lovely Welsh name, and also the name of the great Myf Warhurst, sister of my two oldest Melbourne musician buddies, Andre and Kit.
The next morning, I still had the misheard lyrics in my head, “Myfanwy ain’t the girl she used to be”, and decided it was too cute to ignore.
Songwriting Process:
So, I had a chord pattern idea that rocked back and forth from E major to A major with a relaxed feel, and as soon as I put the lyric idea with this and changed the George Formby melody (a bit) it began to take on the shape of a song.
The cuteness of that first line “Myfanwy ain’t the girl she used to be” rattled around in my head for about 2 weeks, giving rise to several other versions such as “Myfanwy ain’t the girl we used to know” and “Myfanwy looks so happy every day”. It was the rhythm of these lines that suggested they were keepers, as well as the potential rhymings for “be”, “know” and “day”. These variations led to a theme, or story involving Myfanwy, a friend who could drink us under the table, outlast the best of us, but who finally found someone to settle down with.
It’s not actually written about Myf (Warhurst), but I kept her in mind as I wrote the lyrics, more as a focal point than any biographical purpose.
Quick sidetrack: let me tell you about onsens. An onsen in Japan is a public bath, usually separated into a men’s section and a women’s section. Occasionally a large one will have a mixed area. Most of the time, the customers are older people. On rare occasions, one can find oneself alone or sharing the space with only one or two other people.
During the winter of 2019, I was lucky enough to find the beautiful Kirishima Royal Hotel onsen almost deserted, save for one or two old farmers wandering in and out. Relaxing in the big pool (bath?) alone, I began to ‘hear’ what I had of the song in my head. It was within about 20 minutes of soaking and humming and seriously committing an entire original song arrangement in my dumb brain, that I had completed Myfanwy, from the acoustic guitar intro to the key change play-out at the end! I couldn’t get out and dried and dressed quick enough to sing the arrangement into the iPhone voice memo recorder (indispensable!) in the change-room.
Here are my notes from that voice memo: (notice that it was still called May idea 05, because the original idea of | E / A7 / | came in May 2018. Also my instruction ‘bombastic rock’ ha ha!)
And here are the lyrics:
Myfanwy ain't the girl she used to be
She used to sink champagne, but now it’s tea
She’s acting kinda strange, her life is re-arranged, it’s plain to see.
Myfanwy ain't the girl we used to know
She’s trying so hard not to let it show
They think it might be drugs, I think she’s in love, but who’s to know?
But I've got nothing to say,
'Cause I've got nothing to do with it.
It's not my beeswax anyway,
She's finally found her happiness, and we all wish her well.
Now I've got nothing to do,
But I've got nothing to say about it.
We're gonna miss her, that's true
But she's finally found her happiness, and we all wish her well.
Myfanwy looks so happy every day (Myfanwy is a girl we used to know)
Like Mr. Sun, this song ended up with no chorus! Here’s the song, complete with the aforementioned (in the video at least) Taishogoto solo!
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