True Love was recorded and completed with Jon Brion in early 2001. Elliott showed up with the song on a two-inch reel the night he got to Dave McConnell's studio, great anecdote here from the p4k oral history:
When he showed up, it was around 2 a.m., and he was in two cars; his girlfriend [Valerie Deerin] was driving one car and he was driving the other car, and both cars were full of all of his belongings. I mean everything from his apartment. I was thinking he was gonna show up with a suitcase and a backpack and a couple of guitars, but it was like five guitars, a giant keyboard, amps, and then five suitcases of clothes. He had toys, books, you name it. And then he had medication, and various other things.He also brought all his his two-inch reels that he was working on at Jon’s house. So we drank a couple of beers and I gave him the tour of the place and everything, and then he goes, "OK, there’s a song on here that I recorded by myself at Jon’s place that I want to keep, that I really like. Why don’t you just mix this song for me and I’ll be back in the morning.” Then he left. He was like, "I’ve got some errands to run right now, I’ve got some stuff I gotta do.” Remember, this is 2 a.m.—well no, by now it’s 4 a.m., because we had talked about my philosophy on recording and producing for two hours.
So I put the reel on the machine and I started listening to the song, just by myself. And the first time I heard it, just pushing up the faders so I could hear the different instruments and his voice, I got the chills. It was one of the most haunting, beautiful songs I’d ever heard. It sounded nothing like the music I’d heard him do before. It sounded way more intricate, way more complex.
It reminded me of Rachmaninoff, but with lyrics, with a story. Sitting in there alone, I almost had an out-of-body experience because I knew that I was about to work on one of the best things I’d ever worked on in my life. So I spent the next three or four hours mixing the song, which was called "True Love Is a Rose". It's a shame because that song never ended up on the album. He wanted it to be on the album, it was one of his favorites.
So he finally got back, listened to my mix, loved it, and then he says, "Let’s start recording another song." At this point he probably hasn’t slept in two days.
― flappy bird, Wednesday, 25 January 2017 18:23 (seven years ago) link