Elizabeth, You Make Me Smile (4:32)

On May 3, 2011 The Bards announced their new lead singer was the 24 year old singer-songwriter Brandon Caulfield, who has recently been creating a name for himself with his second album Into The Wild Part II, the reaction has been overwhelmingly positive and it became pretty clear that his star is clearly rising. Having signed a two album solo record deal with JR Rhythm’s label Cosmic Records in December 2010 it’s evident that Caulfield has been on The Bards lead guitarist’s radar for a while now and following on from the positive reaction for Caulfield’s work and The Bards interest in bringing in a new lead singer it’s pretty clear who the obvious choice was.
Various names have been thrown around in terms of who was going to take over the lead singer role with The Bards, Caulfield was mentioned heavily and quickly became one of the front-runners, but names like Eric Quillington, Matt Urie, Nicole Woods, Michelle Green and Alicia Lena were all mentioned having all worked with the band in the past on their Allies I, II and III collection. However the favourite remained Mr. Caulfield and it was duly announced on May 3, 2011.

This is an extremely high profile role for anyone to fill and the fact that the promising young 24 year old has agreed to take on this mammoth task, show’s his confidence. The band have gone through three singers in their history and some have question Caulfield’s decision with many believing that the role is cursed with future vocalists struggling to live up to the extremely high expectations of the original lead singer Jack Fate.
Whether this venture will be a success or a failure remains to be seen but having announced their debut single the only thing that is clear is that only time will tell.


Song Description
The song begins with the piano introduction from Brandon Caulfield, quickly followed by J.R Rhythm on guitar, Moe Z on Bass and T. Tome on Drums. The piano becomes the most dominant instrument as Brandon begins to sing the first lines of the song, “Lonely And Bitter/Fragile And Broken/Your Words Are Final/Now That You’ve Spoken.” With his trademark soft vocals, but as the song continues, The Bards begin to hit full gear with J.R Rhythm leading Caulfield into a more powerful vocal, as Caulfield begins to raise his voice and show’s how he will fit into this band and he begins to sing, “And I’ll Sing To You … My Sweetheart/But I’m Not The Man I Was, When I Wrote This Song/So I’m Gonna Need You To Help Me, To Sing Along/And I’ll Sing To You … My Sweetheart.”

The vocal somewhat reminiscent to Born To Run-era Bruce Springsteen and as the song continues on, it becomes clear that Caulfield is relishing performing with such a strong musical pedigree alongside him, the question now is how will the band take to having this young guy being centre of attention.
As the song comes towards the chorus it becomes clear that this song was written by Caulfield, with his trademark Songwriting style coming across and his penchant for a rhyming chorus as he sings, “And You Know You Quench My Thirst/If Only For A Little While/Because Elizabeth/You Make Me Smile.”
The song then continues with the band in full swing and Caulfield more than holding his own with these musical heavyweights, Caulfield inhales a deep breath which can clearly be heard on the song, I’d say it was kept in on purpose, perhaps to add to the effect and he then begins to sing again, “But This Time It Will Be Different For Us, You’ll See/Because Your Beauty Has Been Haunting Me/And When You Smile, The World Crumbles To The Ground/But That’s Ok, Because Your Still Around.” and with that the music begins to soften again as Caulfield repeats the chorus two more times before the song ends.


Songwriter’s Analysis
“I wrote this song, in a two week period recently. It was written in Elizabethtown, Indiana in April during my recording for Into The Wild Part II, I played it a couple of times during the recording sessions, once just on the piano and once just with the acoustic guitar and although I thought it was beautiful, I just didn’t get the feeling that it fit very well into the album, It was missing something and I think what it was missing was a bit of power and emphasis which is where The Bards came in, we met up in the studio in Indiana and played around with a couple of songs I had written and when we played this one together it was a pretty magical moment for me, I’ve followed these guys careers since I can remember, my parents were pretty big fans and that was sort of passed down to me I guess and when we did this song together it just fit perfectly and it gave it that power that I felt it was missing, It was a truly amazing moment for me to hear it for the first time and I was just in a sort of state of disbelief really, it was a truly incredible moment.
When I first spoke to the guys about becoming lead singer they made it clear that they wanted this new stage of their career to be different, they said they wanted me to take control from the beginning in terms of Songwriting and they’ve given me the opportunity and freedom to create something special, they’re still hugely involved and we’re writing songs together but they made it clear that they wanted me to sort of take the reigns with the band and just sort of see where things go with it, I know the challenge is pretty huge having followed the band since I first heard them when I was a kid and I know it’s gonna be pretty tricky to build upon the work they’ve created in the past but I’m positive about what we can do, I think we can create something really special here and make something that can really stand up against the bands previous work and I’m looking forward to the challenge, it’s gonna be an amazing journey and I think I can do this.”
- Brandon Caulfield


Lyric Preview
“Lonely And Bitter
Fragile And Broken
Your Words Are Final
Now That You’ve Spoken
---
And I’ll Sing To You … My Sweetheart
But I’m Not The Man I Was, When I Wrote This Song
So I’m Gonna Need You To Help Me, To Sing Along
And I’ll Sing To You … My Sweetheart
---
And You Know You Quench My Thirst
If Only For A Little While
Because Elizabeth
You Make Me Smile.
---
But This Time It Will Be Different For Us, You’ll See
Because Your Beauty Has Been Haunting Me
And When You Smile, The World Crumbles To The Ground
But That‘s Ok, Because Your Still Around.”


Personnel
Brandon Caulfield - Vocals, Piano, Guitar, Songwriting
J.R Rhythm - Guitar
Moe Z - Bassist
T. Tome - Drums
Jax - Keyboards, Synths, World Instruments