125% seemed like the perfect song to open the album with. As a composer, the song represented a new barrier crossed. As a piece of music, the song worked as a muscular instrumental overture to the other songs.

For years, I had been listening to bands like Yes, King Crimson, Led Zeppelin, and Jethro Tull who regularly mix strange time signatures into their music. I had tried on numerous occasions to compose a song that was not in 4/4 time (or the also common 3/4 time), but the results always felt too mechanical. The strange time signature always overwhelmed the song, like a bunch of math majors were playing the instruments.

I was considering this dilemma one day in the shower, of all places, when this 5/4 rhythm presented itself in my mind. Somehow it felt natural to throw in that extra beat. The extra beat gives the song its title, as a 5/4 measure is 125% the length of a 4/4 measure.

I set up the 5/4 drum machine pattern to start the song, having Miles Davis' On the Corner album in mind (a percussion freak out if there ever was one). I had no idea what would eventually go over it. I even tossed in a couple of short 4/4 sections just to prove I could switch back and forth. I knew I wanted a heavy bottom, so I improvised a fuzz bass line throughout.

Each time I overdubbed an instrument, another instrument suggested itself: lead guitar, piano solos, some organ chords. A little digital editing later, and I had a new song that sounded nothing at all like any of the prog rock bands I had been inspired by.

Rick Hines: electric guitar, MIDI keyboard (piano, organ, strings), 5-string bass, drum machine.

Produced, arranged, engineered, edited, mixed and mastered by Rick Hines.

Recorded May 22-June 7, 2009 at Rick's Studio, San Diego, California.