‘Before We Had It All’ (feat. Madeline Gibbs) – Official Release

So excited to share this song with everyone. It was the second song that I wrote with Joanna Yaeger, a fantastic Nashville-based singer songwriter, after bringing just the idea for the chorus melody / chord progression to her on back in 2017.

It’s a happy take on love and the importance of remembering and celebrating what we have, not necessarily what we’re working toward.

The song is a story of two people, deeply in love, setting out on an exciting adventure together. They knowing the material pleasures of the world will tempt them (because they’re both driven to succeed), but they remind themselves that what they have (in their shared love and commitment to each other) is more than half the equation of finding meaning and success in life, and more important than the other measurements of success out there that they’re both driven to obtain.

It’s been one of my favorite songs for a long time and upon demo-ing the song to Dominic Gibbs, my producer in Nashville, we set out to record it.

Our first attempt somehow missed the mark – we got excited adding instruments and sounds and my vocal performance just wasn’t what I wanted, and so for a while we shelved the song, seeing if that version would grow on us while we worked on other songs throughout 2019.

Finally, knowing the song itself was strong, we decided to take another crack at it at the end of 2019. We started over from scratch and went for a more minimalist, intimate approach with the vocals and instrumentation.

Additionally, we gave Madeline more of a presence throughout the song (she’d sang on the original version), and the ultimate product was something that we all agreed was more mature and authentic to the song and to my vibe as an artist.

Can’t be more thankful to Dominic and Madeline for their work on this song, and for staying true to the art throughout the process. And thank you to Joanna Yaeger for helping write one of my absolute favorites.

Hope that you all enjoy – it’s now streaming on Spotify / Apple Music / YouTube, etc – so be sure to follow my profile on your favorite streaming platform and share the song with friends.

‘Before We Had It All’ – words and music by Cecil Charles and Joanna Yaeger

VERSE 1

Stuffing pennies and memories

from a whole lifetime in an old suitcase

who knew how, when, the time or place?

Our hand-me-down car set out,

our restless hearts, drive for days,

we were going somewhere.

Hey, we’re halfway there.

CHORUS

It won’t take much, we have enough now don’t we?

Some call it luck, we call it love, and maybe

fortunes are fine but they won’t buy us, baby,

’cause we had it all along,

before we had, before we had it all.

VERSE 2

Shiny towns made of glass

and all those things people want so bad…

looking in to see what we could have.

In trading all our old for new

what could we lose? Would we want it back?

We’re still going somewhere.

Hey we’re halfway there.

CHORUS

BRIDGE

All I need is you. All I need is you. All I need is you.

All I need is you because…

CHORUS x2