Either helpful or hurtful
I did not go to Bordentown,
And feel empty of emotion
And the music plays on.
Sunday, November 30, 2014
Sunday, August 31, 2014
You Love A Mother Man
He was used to being the one the girls would walk away from.
And so it was no surprise to him when he saw that look in her eyes. About another man.
"I Truly Understand"
And so it was no surprise to him when he saw that look in her eyes. About another man.
"I Truly Understand"
Rain Songs of the 1960's
The early songs existed in partial photographs. God, he could write a whole new set of songs based on these photographs alone. And all the things that were left out of them.
How the girl's hand, just below the photograph, remained bare, even though he had BEGGED her to marry him. She was wise. Wiser than he.
But WOW, they had some lovely moments together. He had trapped her in a barn on a shoot, it wasn't raining, but maybe if it was, she'd have stayed longer. She made some remarkable observation and he could still smell the hay, and wondered if her hair would smell that sweet. And if she'd let him put his nose in her hair.
A year later, he could ask anything of any girl, they'd let him put his nose and any other body part wherever he'd like, and they'd be eager. But she never fully warmed up to him.
Even now, she was as old as he was, somehow she looked like a grandmother-type and he wore the look of a has-been rocker. She had kept her radiant smile, and he still fell for her every time. Now she was more likely to pose with him, with her arms around him, as if they were still good friends, or as if they had been lovers.
As if she hadn't married a music producer, had a few kids, gone on her own road-as complicated as his. And still in the business, playing grannies and other old lady parts. Clinging to him for whatever aura of fading fame. They still shared a smile of possibility, of lovers who've never consummated.
Maybe too late to ask her, or if he did, he was sure to be disappointed. Maybe she was the type who had left sex back in her 50's. Better not to ask-unless they get to have a long conversation-unless she stays long after the concert. But she "Had to go". Again, that phrase. The awkward parting of people who have more to discuss. Better to leave the party early, while there is still fun to be had.
(And that was how she died, with the conversation still ahead of them. So much to reunite over. He should have insisted she stay. Opened a bottle of champagne, or sparkling apple juice. Anything to get her to realize the moment, how precious it was. But she was gone. Dematerialized as quickly as she'd come.
START WITH?? He never knew who was in the audience until after the show. Even then, he couldn't be sure of those people who just didn't have the nerve to come backstage. Some people just looked like other people. Only so many faces and arrangements of features available; only so many variations on a theme. But that night, he was sure he saw Val in the back. That same radiant smile. That song that was not about her , but was. The songwriters confessed they had seen a call sheet with her name, it was floating in the immediate ether. They chose it because it had enough syllables. They wrote the song on the way to the producers' office.)
This recent picture, taken just before her death, his nose is close enough to her hair. She smelled like shampoo. And his fantasies began anew.
From "You and me and rain on the roof"
Lovin Spoonful
(Him in love with Val)
How the girl's hand, just below the photograph, remained bare, even though he had BEGGED her to marry him. She was wise. Wiser than he.
But WOW, they had some lovely moments together. He had trapped her in a barn on a shoot, it wasn't raining, but maybe if it was, she'd have stayed longer. She made some remarkable observation and he could still smell the hay, and wondered if her hair would smell that sweet. And if she'd let him put his nose in her hair.
A year later, he could ask anything of any girl, they'd let him put his nose and any other body part wherever he'd like, and they'd be eager. But she never fully warmed up to him.
Even now, she was as old as he was, somehow she looked like a grandmother-type and he wore the look of a has-been rocker. She had kept her radiant smile, and he still fell for her every time. Now she was more likely to pose with him, with her arms around him, as if they were still good friends, or as if they had been lovers.
As if she hadn't married a music producer, had a few kids, gone on her own road-as complicated as his. And still in the business, playing grannies and other old lady parts. Clinging to him for whatever aura of fading fame. They still shared a smile of possibility, of lovers who've never consummated.
Maybe too late to ask her, or if he did, he was sure to be disappointed. Maybe she was the type who had left sex back in her 50's. Better not to ask-unless they get to have a long conversation-unless she stays long after the concert. But she "Had to go". Again, that phrase. The awkward parting of people who have more to discuss. Better to leave the party early, while there is still fun to be had.
(And that was how she died, with the conversation still ahead of them. So much to reunite over. He should have insisted she stay. Opened a bottle of champagne, or sparkling apple juice. Anything to get her to realize the moment, how precious it was. But she was gone. Dematerialized as quickly as she'd come.
START WITH?? He never knew who was in the audience until after the show. Even then, he couldn't be sure of those people who just didn't have the nerve to come backstage. Some people just looked like other people. Only so many faces and arrangements of features available; only so many variations on a theme. But that night, he was sure he saw Val in the back. That same radiant smile. That song that was not about her , but was. The songwriters confessed they had seen a call sheet with her name, it was floating in the immediate ether. They chose it because it had enough syllables. They wrote the song on the way to the producers' office.)
This recent picture, taken just before her death, his nose is close enough to her hair. She smelled like shampoo. And his fantasies began anew.
From "You and me and rain on the roof"
Lovin Spoonful
(Him in love with Val)
Why The Hell Are You SO SAD??
And then she blew up.
"What the fuck are you thinking? Why the Hell are we DOING this? If you are going to be such a FUCKING BASTARD about everything, why the FUCK am I devoting so much time to you?? I have to apologize to EVERYONE we meet about how awful you are, just so we can try to make music. But EVERYTHING has to be done your way, even when YOU can't stay on pitch and you forget the chords!!
The band wasn't used to her swearing so sincerely. Or even her screaming at the top of her lungs. In short, she was the one who had kept everyone together. They all kept their eyes low to the ground and thought about how much much was in their bank account. And if they could get back that gig they had so smugly said NO to.
The high wire/wired act was over.
"I don't need to take this!" he said and slung his guitar up over his shoulder, getting tangled in the cable and custom Japanese shoulderstrap at the same time.
"Yes, you do! See how awful it is to work with someone who screams, who yells? We all do this to make you happy. You do this to make you happy-but you are so stuck inside yourself that you can't see happiness , she stepped into his potential path and he stopped. Stuck listening to her, waiting for his next opportunity to exit the scene on stage.
It was all true.
"What the fuck are you thinking? Why the Hell are we DOING this? If you are going to be such a FUCKING BASTARD about everything, why the FUCK am I devoting so much time to you?? I have to apologize to EVERYONE we meet about how awful you are, just so we can try to make music. But EVERYTHING has to be done your way, even when YOU can't stay on pitch and you forget the chords!!
The band wasn't used to her swearing so sincerely. Or even her screaming at the top of her lungs. In short, she was the one who had kept everyone together. They all kept their eyes low to the ground and thought about how much much was in their bank account. And if they could get back that gig they had so smugly said NO to.
The high wire/wired act was over.
"I don't need to take this!" he said and slung his guitar up over his shoulder, getting tangled in the cable and custom Japanese shoulderstrap at the same time.
"Yes, you do! See how awful it is to work with someone who screams, who yells? We all do this to make you happy. You do this to make you happy-but you are so stuck inside yourself that you can't see happiness , she stepped into his potential path and he stopped. Stuck listening to her, waiting for his next opportunity to exit the scene on stage.
It was all true.
Saturday, July 19, 2014
"And nothing hurts sweeter than a song"
Mondegreen:
"Ain't Nothin' Heard Sweeter Than a Song"
===
"Found" article on the unreleased video of the "Best New Group in Vocal-Jazz-Ease"
(unreleased song found in the university archives). (The author had very little info and obviously did minimal research. He/she could not even discover the female singer's name, so it is not confirmed that this is indeed her. It sounds an awful lot like her. (And there is a program in the archives with PT, her and MD doing a performance at Rose Hall at Jazz at Lincoln Center. And there is that recurring phrase in her letters, to that "evening by the Park", "sunset" and "the wall of windows", the evening when he proposed to her-the very event he would later deny.
This video session would have been recorded in the afternoon, with a white backdrop behind them, on the very stage they would be performing on. There is mention of a single long shot, which describes this very setup. And includes the gorgeous view of what must be Central Park in full Autumn colors)
(The Bottom Line, Saratoga Springs-place named after ....
==
The article is as follows:
The archival video was edited to include the outtakes. It clocks in at exactly 3:31, the same length as the released recording. However, the video has been in the possession of the original recording company and never released to the public.
The entire session is extant (16:08). It includes only 3 attempts at the song, including the first, which was aborted prior to the second verse due to the female singer being overwhelmed by laughter (otherwise known as "cutting up").
The polished video (hereafter referred to Tape #4, as catalogued by the record company) begins with a bridge, which includes various members either laughing to someone off-camera, or flirting directly with the camera.
She begins by snapping directly in front of the camera, which seems to be one of the only clear moments of choreography that was followed.
Everyone seems to either be tipsy, drunk, or just naturally happy. The two male singers have a known history of working together for 30+ years in another comedy band. The female singer's name is unrecorded.
She is sandwiched in the center, the bearded male singer behind her standing close and starting with his hand on her downstage hip. As they sing, he begins to embrace her as they all begin to sway in unison.
In short order, he begins to encircle her waist with his hands, and it is
The second time around, they begin in place. At the moment which someone, presumably the director ____ (2:08) is heard to say :"Let's go again right away", there is a sudden uncharacteristic (in the rest of the video) motion which the female singer makes to the bearded singer. She pulls one of his hands off of her waist dismissively, as if it were irritating her.
This action is noteworthy in that the rest of the video explores permissiveness and the three performers seem to be VERY comfortable with each other indeed.
In fact, the overt style of the original song seems to have comedic intent indeed ("Just retain your poise/Sing a pretty noise)
Notes:
Recording of Lambert, Hendricks & Ross, Vocalese
Lyrics:
http://www.gugalyrics.com/lyrics-2390791/lambert,-hendricks-%26-ross-in-a-mellow-tone.html
Video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CVE8bG_YBcg
"Ain't Nothin' Heard Sweeter Than a Song"
===
"Found" article on the unreleased video of the "Best New Group in Vocal-Jazz-Ease"
(unreleased song found in the university archives). (The author had very little info and obviously did minimal research. He/she could not even discover the female singer's name, so it is not confirmed that this is indeed her. It sounds an awful lot like her. (And there is a program in the archives with PT, her and MD doing a performance at Rose Hall at Jazz at Lincoln Center. And there is that recurring phrase in her letters, to that "evening by the Park", "sunset" and "the wall of windows", the evening when he proposed to her-the very event he would later deny.
This video session would have been recorded in the afternoon, with a white backdrop behind them, on the very stage they would be performing on. There is mention of a single long shot, which describes this very setup. And includes the gorgeous view of what must be Central Park in full Autumn colors)
(The Bottom Line, Saratoga Springs-place named after ....
==
The article is as follows:
The archival video was edited to include the outtakes. It clocks in at exactly 3:31, the same length as the released recording. However, the video has been in the possession of the original recording company and never released to the public.
The entire session is extant (16:08). It includes only 3 attempts at the song, including the first, which was aborted prior to the second verse due to the female singer being overwhelmed by laughter (otherwise known as "cutting up").
The polished video (hereafter referred to Tape #4, as catalogued by the record company) begins with a bridge, which includes various members either laughing to someone off-camera, or flirting directly with the camera.
She begins by snapping directly in front of the camera, which seems to be one of the only clear moments of choreography that was followed.
Everyone seems to either be tipsy, drunk, or just naturally happy. The two male singers have a known history of working together for 30+ years in another comedy band. The female singer's name is unrecorded.
She is sandwiched in the center, the bearded male singer behind her standing close and starting with his hand on her downstage hip. As they sing, he begins to embrace her as they all begin to sway in unison.
In short order, he begins to encircle her waist with his hands, and it is
The second time around, they begin in place. At the moment which someone, presumably the director ____ (2:08) is heard to say :"Let's go again right away", there is a sudden uncharacteristic (in the rest of the video) motion which the female singer makes to the bearded singer. She pulls one of his hands off of her waist dismissively, as if it were irritating her.
This action is noteworthy in that the rest of the video explores permissiveness and the three performers seem to be VERY comfortable with each other indeed.
In fact, the overt style of the original song seems to have comedic intent indeed ("Just retain your poise/Sing a pretty noise)
Notes:
Recording of Lambert, Hendricks & Ross, Vocalese
Lyrics:
http://www.gugalyrics.com/lyrics-2390791/lambert,-hendricks-%26-ross-in-a-mellow-tone.html
Video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CVE8bG_YBcg
Thursday, July 17, 2014
Every Word You've Whispered
"This is a total fangirl song."
"Yeah, right?"
"I'm going to play it slowly."
"Don't be surprised if I go out of tune."
"Well, stay in tune. No matter what speed I play."
===
The first time she sang it, that's all she thought about. How scared she was when she first met him.
He liked the "Vulnerable" sound in her voice, especially as it grew into the confident part.
Then she thought more about him.
How this could be a song about when they first met, yes.
But also a bride singing it, thinking about her future.
How there are so many songs about the falling in love, but so few about staying in love.
And then she placed herself exactly in reality.
As if they were the characters she was singing about.
He is holding back.
But she wants to let him know it's okay.
She's seen the ugly, drunk side of him, and she still imagines everything to be beautiful.
Because it will be.
Because the reality is better than the dream.
I Have Dreamed, sung by Nancy Lamott
"Yeah, right?"
"I'm going to play it slowly."
"Don't be surprised if I go out of tune."
"Well, stay in tune. No matter what speed I play."
===
The first time she sang it, that's all she thought about. How scared she was when she first met him.
He liked the "Vulnerable" sound in her voice, especially as it grew into the confident part.
Then she thought more about him.
How this could be a song about when they first met, yes.
But also a bride singing it, thinking about her future.
How there are so many songs about the falling in love, but so few about staying in love.
And then she placed herself exactly in reality.
As if they were the characters she was singing about.
He is holding back.
But she wants to let him know it's okay.
She's seen the ugly, drunk side of him, and she still imagines everything to be beautiful.
Because it will be.
Because the reality is better than the dream.
I Have Dreamed, sung by Nancy Lamott
Thursday, June 12, 2014
Dark are the Stars That Shine
The next performer was a young female singer and a full band with a ridiculous name. They had seen this configuration before; played on the same vill, even. This star had opened for them, and they had most recently (and graciously) opened for her.
Settling down in the darkness for another round of familiar music. Why does he keep doing this to himself?
Music festival. Again. Camping out because it is easier on the wallet. Not that it is unusual for them to go without showers or to be roughing it. It's just nice to be part of a larger audience.
Back with all the smelly hippies.
Oh god, how he misses the 60's.
She had picked a perfect spot on the grass, an incline so steep they didn't need an adjustable lawn-chair. Even with her sun umbrellas, they both got Sun-Sick during the day, that burning sensation that gets into your intestines. This is what is feels like to be baked alive. They traded off and wandered independently and together. Leaving behind their worldly goods on the blanket so they could walk holding hands for a while in the sun. And I love her.
At a hippie music festival, the most valuable of valuables is sun screen or water, and really-if you need it that badly-help yourself. Money and equipment was locked up in the car. Which was now cemented around by baked mud. The first night had a biblical thunderstorm and rumors of a tornado. The dance tent collapsed on Friday, but was resurrected on Saturday morning, which gave the survivors a sense of solidarity and hopefulness that the sun would dry things out.
By Sunday afternoon, the apple cheeked kids would be baked to a crisp. But it was still Saturday night, plenty of time to still Relax and Enjoy. Distant smells of barbeque were enough to tempt a longtime vegetarian like himself. (He had a burger every so often, but never told Her).
And then, there was a perfect view of the sunset earlier that night. As if he had never seen a sunset before. The path of the sun in an arc overhead, and then to the rim of the far mountain, casting a premature shadow on them. Bringing a chill. But the colors kept changing, even when the ball of fire had disappeared over whatever the real horizon was. Further away, mountains beyond mountains, the sky kept changing. Out here in Western Mass, or Eastern New York, or Northwestern Connecticut, whatever you called it. No noxious gasses to enhance the color and the irony. Sweet smelling air, and lots of wondrous slow moving color, like being on acid. Like a being who is trapped in a lava lamp. And I love her.
Being in a car mostly, you dread the change of circumstance between light and dark. You hope to make it to your destination with plenty of time to learn the route from the bar to the motel room. Sometimes you fight it on your own and trust the GPS. This was a thing that had seriously frightened him. It had been on his top 10 list of reasons NOT to tour again. 10 years ago. He always figured if he had 10 reasons NOT to do something, it overruled the Joy of Performing. Why was he doing this to himself? Funny how Her presence drives away all the fears and discomforts. And I love her.
Somehow, he had amnesia. He could never remember being sober when drunk. Or drunk when sober. Never remembered how Glorious he felt when singing and receiving applause, or even the glow after-show of someone giving a genuine compliment. That little girl giving him a flower, saying she really liked that funny song.
That little girl in the loft, dancing, when he played at the Red Barn in Goshen. She kept running in front of the stage and completing the circle backstage. He tried to make a joke about her, gently, after his first song. Adopted by his lesbian friends from some mother with drug abuse and lots of stories that all ended badly. All the kids he'd never have.
Maybe he should pin a hole in the condom. Do it sneaky. Act slightly mad when she turns up surprised and pregnant. Pretend he's jealous of whoever else she has. But he'd raise the kid.
Her kid.
Their kid.
What is he thinking about? Really? Their legacy is The Music. Here, people recognize them. They are a Regular Duo. Opening day they do a set, and a few workshops during the weekend. PR for music. The kid who says: "Someday I'd like to be on that stage!" And he waves that kid up.
"Come on. Now is your chance, don't miss an opportunity!"
And how She looks at him in those moments. She witnesses. And I love her.
She can't play guitar. Doesn't have the elegant hands or the skill. Dylan hates women guitarists. Thinks they look cheap. She has no musical training. She has a lovely voice, that blends away all bad notes, that saves him and his songs.
The song on stage sends out a single word, " . . . tenderly . . . " It lingers in the air somehow, like the sound system had an extend pedal on the microphone.
He looks at her, gazes at her. That's exactly it. She's so tender with me. And I love her.
And lying here, on the blanket with Her, staring up at the stars, listening to a band in the distance, he tears up. Another moment he'll lose. He's forgetting things now, so many things. Losing the thread, where things happened, and with who. It's partly him aging, but he's worried about something larger. Alzheimer's. Or Dementia. Dr. Dementia. It's really not funny.
As if he is so rich with these moments, he can afford to lose it. He collects shit, a packrat in his house and car. But his mental life is spartan.
He needs to remember THIS moment. How beautiful She is, this line of music-the guitar-and then the voices when they sing accapella-a surprise to highlight the beauty of a single line. Taking it from a simple love song to the thing that makes him CRY. And he rarely cries for beauty.
Already, he wants to call it back, to rewind the moment. Panic seizes him. Wanting to keep the music from ending. Don't stop, he thinks-DON'T STOP! As if the music is oxygen, as if he's going underwater-losing light and air without it.
The song travels down the road to where it stops and soon there is silence. And a few more feet of road later, applause. The palate cleanser. The turnoff that takes them off the highway. Bringing them back to the reality of the harsh fluorescents of the motel room.
He should ask her to sing that song. Maybe at the fireside swap-no, it might be awkward-trying to steal mainstage glory. Or as a lullabye tonight, in the tent. He knows she knows the words. If they are both awake. If he remembers to remember. It might just be another song that floats away, lost in the sensory jumble of the festival. A bubble, a scarf in the breeze, a tent carried away by a tornado.
He can barely make out the edge of her nose against the moonlight. She turns and snuggles up to him, and he to her, suddenly worried about falling off the mountain. Trying to find something solid to hold on to as the world spins around.
And I Love Her, performed by Heather Maloney
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iNlp89ebdx0
Settling down in the darkness for another round of familiar music. Why does he keep doing this to himself?
Music festival. Again. Camping out because it is easier on the wallet. Not that it is unusual for them to go without showers or to be roughing it. It's just nice to be part of a larger audience.
Back with all the smelly hippies.
Oh god, how he misses the 60's.
She had picked a perfect spot on the grass, an incline so steep they didn't need an adjustable lawn-chair. Even with her sun umbrellas, they both got Sun-Sick during the day, that burning sensation that gets into your intestines. This is what is feels like to be baked alive. They traded off and wandered independently and together. Leaving behind their worldly goods on the blanket so they could walk holding hands for a while in the sun. And I love her.
At a hippie music festival, the most valuable of valuables is sun screen or water, and really-if you need it that badly-help yourself. Money and equipment was locked up in the car. Which was now cemented around by baked mud. The first night had a biblical thunderstorm and rumors of a tornado. The dance tent collapsed on Friday, but was resurrected on Saturday morning, which gave the survivors a sense of solidarity and hopefulness that the sun would dry things out.
By Sunday afternoon, the apple cheeked kids would be baked to a crisp. But it was still Saturday night, plenty of time to still Relax and Enjoy. Distant smells of barbeque were enough to tempt a longtime vegetarian like himself. (He had a burger every so often, but never told Her).
And then, there was a perfect view of the sunset earlier that night. As if he had never seen a sunset before. The path of the sun in an arc overhead, and then to the rim of the far mountain, casting a premature shadow on them. Bringing a chill. But the colors kept changing, even when the ball of fire had disappeared over whatever the real horizon was. Further away, mountains beyond mountains, the sky kept changing. Out here in Western Mass, or Eastern New York, or Northwestern Connecticut, whatever you called it. No noxious gasses to enhance the color and the irony. Sweet smelling air, and lots of wondrous slow moving color, like being on acid. Like a being who is trapped in a lava lamp. And I love her.
Being in a car mostly, you dread the change of circumstance between light and dark. You hope to make it to your destination with plenty of time to learn the route from the bar to the motel room. Sometimes you fight it on your own and trust the GPS. This was a thing that had seriously frightened him. It had been on his top 10 list of reasons NOT to tour again. 10 years ago. He always figured if he had 10 reasons NOT to do something, it overruled the Joy of Performing. Why was he doing this to himself? Funny how Her presence drives away all the fears and discomforts. And I love her.
Somehow, he had amnesia. He could never remember being sober when drunk. Or drunk when sober. Never remembered how Glorious he felt when singing and receiving applause, or even the glow after-show of someone giving a genuine compliment. That little girl giving him a flower, saying she really liked that funny song.
That little girl in the loft, dancing, when he played at the Red Barn in Goshen. She kept running in front of the stage and completing the circle backstage. He tried to make a joke about her, gently, after his first song. Adopted by his lesbian friends from some mother with drug abuse and lots of stories that all ended badly. All the kids he'd never have.
Maybe he should pin a hole in the condom. Do it sneaky. Act slightly mad when she turns up surprised and pregnant. Pretend he's jealous of whoever else she has. But he'd raise the kid.
Her kid.
Their kid.
What is he thinking about? Really? Their legacy is The Music. Here, people recognize them. They are a Regular Duo. Opening day they do a set, and a few workshops during the weekend. PR for music. The kid who says: "Someday I'd like to be on that stage!" And he waves that kid up.
"Come on. Now is your chance, don't miss an opportunity!"
And how She looks at him in those moments. She witnesses. And I love her.
She can't play guitar. Doesn't have the elegant hands or the skill. Dylan hates women guitarists. Thinks they look cheap. She has no musical training. She has a lovely voice, that blends away all bad notes, that saves him and his songs.
The song on stage sends out a single word, " . . . tenderly . . . " It lingers in the air somehow, like the sound system had an extend pedal on the microphone.
He looks at her, gazes at her. That's exactly it. She's so tender with me. And I love her.
And lying here, on the blanket with Her, staring up at the stars, listening to a band in the distance, he tears up. Another moment he'll lose. He's forgetting things now, so many things. Losing the thread, where things happened, and with who. It's partly him aging, but he's worried about something larger. Alzheimer's. Or Dementia. Dr. Dementia. It's really not funny.
As if he is so rich with these moments, he can afford to lose it. He collects shit, a packrat in his house and car. But his mental life is spartan.
He needs to remember THIS moment. How beautiful She is, this line of music-the guitar-and then the voices when they sing accapella-a surprise to highlight the beauty of a single line. Taking it from a simple love song to the thing that makes him CRY. And he rarely cries for beauty.
Already, he wants to call it back, to rewind the moment. Panic seizes him. Wanting to keep the music from ending. Don't stop, he thinks-DON'T STOP! As if the music is oxygen, as if he's going underwater-losing light and air without it.
The song travels down the road to where it stops and soon there is silence. And a few more feet of road later, applause. The palate cleanser. The turnoff that takes them off the highway. Bringing them back to the reality of the harsh fluorescents of the motel room.
He should ask her to sing that song. Maybe at the fireside swap-no, it might be awkward-trying to steal mainstage glory. Or as a lullabye tonight, in the tent. He knows she knows the words. If they are both awake. If he remembers to remember. It might just be another song that floats away, lost in the sensory jumble of the festival. A bubble, a scarf in the breeze, a tent carried away by a tornado.
He can barely make out the edge of her nose against the moonlight. She turns and snuggles up to him, and he to her, suddenly worried about falling off the mountain. Trying to find something solid to hold on to as the world spins around.
And I Love Her, performed by Heather Maloney
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iNlp89ebdx0
Sunday, June 8, 2014
Morgan Freeman in Paris
Freeman Avenue. That's the place they stayed.
"Morgan Freeman in Paris" she sang.
"I was Morgan Freeman in Paris" he responded.
You are my sunshine
SunshineHe whispers in a dreamHe has been dreaming of herAnd of a song he can't quite manage to rememberIt might even be one of hisIt floats away from him like a fragrance of that woman in ColoradoThe one that walked away asShe was wearing whiteShe begins singing to himYou are my sunshineMy only sunshineHer standing by the windows at JALC in the sunsetEarly morning Saturdays, driving to the gigThe sunrise behind herHer making faces at him from behind the wheelPursing her lipsSlightly sticking out her tongueTheir signalFlashes of memoryThem walking down a streetWhere?Portland?Baltimore?Philadelphia?Greenpoint?Somerville?One of those cities which has made an art of trash.Recycled thrift store designIn storefrontsAnd restaurantsUnfinished or peeling ceilings.Hopefully done artfully and to codeHe was always certain there were paint chips in the food he was served.Detritus of the 20th century.Just like The Set of The Show.@@@Staying in an artists loft, surprised by a dog! Someone has discovered them!!No, it must have been later"Hold my hand, it gives me a feeling of security!"Him quoting himself.At a moment when he's more psychic than he intends to be.Screech of tires.
--"It's all downhill from here!"She enthused, just as he was getting a swelled head. Again."Dont quote me," he laughed! Not here, not now! You are creating your own future. The idea of it terrified him. As if he waste Joan Baez to her Dylan. Her Svengali.Plus she was flirting with The Comedian.Not funny.Not allowed!He couldn't Ask Her now.Not on stage, the ring box in his pants pocket.Hard as a cancer.God, she is beautiful when she laughs.Except when the Comedian is making her laugh. Touching her arm, admiring her bracelet.Damn, not tonight.And he was hoping for such great sex, too!Sunshine fading behind herThey had a fight that nightIn the darkWhen the warmth is gone from the day@@@@The light disappearing from his dining room window.Sunshine@@Walking through BrooklynHer holding his handCrossing the streetWas that the accident?He didn't see it.Remembered lifting the baby gently out of the streetHow fine it looked, crying, no bruises or blood evenMaybe 1 or 2No language yetBut beautiful blonde curlsShe said how it had been knocked to the groundAnd how it looked so much worseWhen the paramedics arrivedAnd the parent panic.Where his Old FaceComes in handy, age equals wisdom."I've seen this before""It will all be okay"Which is needed in the momentWords flowing when medicine and real help are still miles away.They tried to call him a hero.But he saw something in the toddlers eyes than made him run away.The dark eyes, pupils dilating like a junkie.Not sure if it was a sign of loss of oxygen or oncoming death.He didn't want to be around to find out.@@@One night, ConnecticutShe told him how she still rememberedAnd wove it into her life narrative about him.How his music and his "gifts"Proved that he was an angel.(and GOD how he needed to hear tTHAT!!)
==
Free Man in Paris by Joni Mitchell
"Morgan Freeman in Paris" she sang.
"I was Morgan Freeman in Paris" he responded.
You are my sunshine
SunshineHe whispers in a dreamHe has been dreaming of herAnd of a song he can't quite manage to rememberIt might even be one of hisIt floats away from him like a fragrance of that woman in ColoradoThe one that walked away asShe was wearing whiteShe begins singing to himYou are my sunshineMy only sunshineHer standing by the windows at JALC in the sunsetEarly morning Saturdays, driving to the gigThe sunrise behind herHer making faces at him from behind the wheelPursing her lipsSlightly sticking out her tongueTheir signalFlashes of memoryThem walking down a streetWhere?Portland?Baltimore?Philadelphia?Greenpoint?Somerville?One of those cities which has made an art of trash.Recycled thrift store designIn storefrontsAnd restaurantsUnfinished or peeling ceilings.Hopefully done artfully and to codeHe was always certain there were paint chips in the food he was served.Detritus of the 20th century.Just like The Set of The Show.@@@Staying in an artists loft, surprised by a dog! Someone has discovered them!!No, it must have been later"Hold my hand, it gives me a feeling of security!"Him quoting himself.At a moment when he's more psychic than he intends to be.Screech of tires.
--"It's all downhill from here!"She enthused, just as he was getting a swelled head. Again."Dont quote me," he laughed! Not here, not now! You are creating your own future. The idea of it terrified him. As if he waste Joan Baez to her Dylan. Her Svengali.Plus she was flirting with The Comedian.Not funny.Not allowed!He couldn't Ask Her now.Not on stage, the ring box in his pants pocket.Hard as a cancer.God, she is beautiful when she laughs.Except when the Comedian is making her laugh. Touching her arm, admiring her bracelet.Damn, not tonight.And he was hoping for such great sex, too!Sunshine fading behind herThey had a fight that nightIn the darkWhen the warmth is gone from the day@@@@The light disappearing from his dining room window.Sunshine@@Walking through BrooklynHer holding his handCrossing the streetWas that the accident?He didn't see it.Remembered lifting the baby gently out of the streetHow fine it looked, crying, no bruises or blood evenMaybe 1 or 2No language yetBut beautiful blonde curlsShe said how it had been knocked to the groundAnd how it looked so much worseWhen the paramedics arrivedAnd the parent panic.Where his Old FaceComes in handy, age equals wisdom."I've seen this before""It will all be okay"Which is needed in the momentWords flowing when medicine and real help are still miles away.They tried to call him a hero.But he saw something in the toddlers eyes than made him run away.The dark eyes, pupils dilating like a junkie.Not sure if it was a sign of loss of oxygen or oncoming death.He didn't want to be around to find out.@@@One night, ConnecticutShe told him how she still rememberedAnd wove it into her life narrative about him.How his music and his "gifts"Proved that he was an angel.(and GOD how he needed to hear tTHAT!!)
==
Free Man in Paris by Joni Mitchell
Wednesday, May 21, 2014
I don't care who you sleep with, but don't you ever SING with anyone else!!
She said this and her whole demeanor turned into a smile.
He should have asked her then.
Begged her.
Got down on his knees and not allowed her to let go of his hand until she agreed to be by his side for the rest of his life.
Because he betrayed her.
After their tour ended, he didn't push to bring her along on the Reunion Tour of The Band. Just didn't mention it. The Cute One was trying to bring his 27year old wife onboard, she was a Star Collector\Fucker if ever there was one. Unstable, Fiery Latina, she had him pussy whipped. All the other Boys in the Band were embarrassed for him.
Especially when they overheard the fights; she'd throw shoes against the wall. Scarring him in the process.
Backstage before rehearsal:
"Nice shiner! What happened to you?"
"I walked into a door."
"You sound like a battered wife!"
They both walked away when they realized how true that statement was.
And so he just couldn't bring any of his own issues to the show. They only needed one female backup singer. The Funny One had his sister and The Rich One had 3 sons and a daughter, plus the opportunistic in-laws.
No room for HER.
And so he went on tour, again and again. Invited her to come along, even. Blue jean Baby, LA Lady. Everything seemed fine.
And them he was Bogart in "Casablanca", rain falling on the note that told him that she wouldn't be coming.
Why she had to go, I don't know, she wouldn't say.
And things were never the same.
He should have asked her then.
Begged her.
Got down on his knees and not allowed her to let go of his hand until she agreed to be by his side for the rest of his life.
Because he betrayed her.
After their tour ended, he didn't push to bring her along on the Reunion Tour of The Band. Just didn't mention it. The Cute One was trying to bring his 27year old wife onboard, she was a Star Collector\Fucker if ever there was one. Unstable, Fiery Latina, she had him pussy whipped. All the other Boys in the Band were embarrassed for him.
Especially when they overheard the fights; she'd throw shoes against the wall. Scarring him in the process.
Backstage before rehearsal:
"Nice shiner! What happened to you?"
"I walked into a door."
"You sound like a battered wife!"
They both walked away when they realized how true that statement was.
And so he just couldn't bring any of his own issues to the show. They only needed one female backup singer. The Funny One had his sister and The Rich One had 3 sons and a daughter, plus the opportunistic in-laws.
No room for HER.
And so he went on tour, again and again. Invited her to come along, even. Blue jean Baby, LA Lady. Everything seemed fine.
And them he was Bogart in "Casablanca", rain falling on the note that told him that she wouldn't be coming.
Why she had to go, I don't know, she wouldn't say.
And things were never the same.
Friday, May 16, 2014
Their First Time
After the concert, after everyone has left, after they are done with discussing the details for tomorrow's event, he casually invites her to stay and help him finish up the champagne. As if it's still part of her job. Not a perk, a responsibility. He still imagines her in her perfect little Catholic school uniform, although she gives off the attitude of wearing a nun's severe black habit.
Champagne never gave him a buzz, so he still drinks it. It's the one alcohol that he still allows himself. Well, and a beer every now and then. But only when he's smoking a joint.
It's more out of habit to offer the rest to her, girls like champagne; it makes them bubbier. And it works with her. They've been flirting heavily in the past week. She even has been taking the lead. Maybe the rock star pheremone has gotten to her.
He approaches her, leading with his lips. A smooth, clean move that usually ends up in a kiss. But she's too giggly. He giggles a bit himself, more as a rescue than a genuine laugh.
"What is it?" he asks finally. The more he looks at her, the more beautiful he sees her. Young skin, pale against her dark hair; her smirk and the playfulness of her expressions. Levels of complexity in her eyes they he hadn't noticed before.
"You're the Rock Star. I can't do it. You were my boss, my rude boss, and now you are this rock star. All those women!! I just had no idea!"
"It's past midnight, would you kiss me if I went back to being your rude boss?"
She giggled at that even more; this was beginning to feel like rejection.
"I mean, lately, it seems like you want to . . ."
"Oh, I do!! I'm not backing out, or being a cock-tease or anything, I just have to stop giggling"
"Because from what you said the other night . . ."
They had come so close . . .. staying up late, planning the logistics for the concert/fundraiser. Getting him ready to be a star took more planning these days. Especially in that house still haunted by his ex wife. #2. How he used the word "Punk" to describe her. Or Goth. And how she misspelled "skeleton" on the wall of the Halloween room. Which ruined all pretensions to seriousness.
The girl had gotten a tour the first night they had gotten together to mail out "Save the Date" postcards. They had begun to make out stuffing envelopes for the detailed invitations. And just this week, the reminder donations had to be out exactly the night before the concert, by request of his boss. What had changed other than his incredible performance onstage? He found the same old fear of failure factor, present in his touring days. Not being able to live up to the rock star role in the bedroom. He was even intimidated by himself. But even Cary Grant is not Cary Grant all the time, and he had to figure out a way to stop being himself in the moment.
After a few more minutes of hesitation nuzzling, he got a brilliant idea.
"Why don't YOU be the Rock Star?"
What?
You just played an incredible concert and I am the star struck fan!
He dropped to his knees in a sexy, worshipful gesture.
More giggling.
But there was a certain light in her eyes.
How about if I go outside and come back in. Seriously! Give yourself a minute to prepare!!
While he was out of the room, she grabbed a feather boa, left behind by a rich and sloppy drunken admirer of too many years who had talked her way backstage and then up into the hotel room by doing god-knows-what to all the Security men. He recognized her and excused them for a period of no longer than 10 minutes. She was shocked when she imagined what actually happened. The boa ended up on a lamp. The hotel room had a certain Zsa Zsa Gabor overdone glamor which matched the groupie, and she played up the setting. Even adopting a terrible an inconsistent accent.
And so they began a charade, him declaring himself as "Roomservice" in a deep tone. A fan's story of sneaking into her hotel room.
She began to enjoy it.
And laugh like a woman in charge of herself.
Champagne never gave him a buzz, so he still drinks it. It's the one alcohol that he still allows himself. Well, and a beer every now and then. But only when he's smoking a joint.
It's more out of habit to offer the rest to her, girls like champagne; it makes them bubbier. And it works with her. They've been flirting heavily in the past week. She even has been taking the lead. Maybe the rock star pheremone has gotten to her.
He approaches her, leading with his lips. A smooth, clean move that usually ends up in a kiss. But she's too giggly. He giggles a bit himself, more as a rescue than a genuine laugh.
"What is it?" he asks finally. The more he looks at her, the more beautiful he sees her. Young skin, pale against her dark hair; her smirk and the playfulness of her expressions. Levels of complexity in her eyes they he hadn't noticed before.
"You're the Rock Star. I can't do it. You were my boss, my rude boss, and now you are this rock star. All those women!! I just had no idea!"
"It's past midnight, would you kiss me if I went back to being your rude boss?"
She giggled at that even more; this was beginning to feel like rejection.
"I mean, lately, it seems like you want to . . ."
"Oh, I do!! I'm not backing out, or being a cock-tease or anything, I just have to stop giggling"
"Because from what you said the other night . . ."
They had come so close . . .. staying up late, planning the logistics for the concert/fundraiser. Getting him ready to be a star took more planning these days. Especially in that house still haunted by his ex wife. #2. How he used the word "Punk" to describe her. Or Goth. And how she misspelled "skeleton" on the wall of the Halloween room. Which ruined all pretensions to seriousness.
The girl had gotten a tour the first night they had gotten together to mail out "Save the Date" postcards. They had begun to make out stuffing envelopes for the detailed invitations. And just this week, the reminder donations had to be out exactly the night before the concert, by request of his boss. What had changed other than his incredible performance onstage? He found the same old fear of failure factor, present in his touring days. Not being able to live up to the rock star role in the bedroom. He was even intimidated by himself. But even Cary Grant is not Cary Grant all the time, and he had to figure out a way to stop being himself in the moment.
After a few more minutes of hesitation nuzzling, he got a brilliant idea.
"Why don't YOU be the Rock Star?"
What?
You just played an incredible concert and I am the star struck fan!
He dropped to his knees in a sexy, worshipful gesture.
More giggling.
But there was a certain light in her eyes.
How about if I go outside and come back in. Seriously! Give yourself a minute to prepare!!
While he was out of the room, she grabbed a feather boa, left behind by a rich and sloppy drunken admirer of too many years who had talked her way backstage and then up into the hotel room by doing god-knows-what to all the Security men. He recognized her and excused them for a period of no longer than 10 minutes. She was shocked when she imagined what actually happened. The boa ended up on a lamp. The hotel room had a certain Zsa Zsa Gabor overdone glamor which matched the groupie, and she played up the setting. Even adopting a terrible an inconsistent accent.
And so they began a charade, him declaring himself as "Roomservice" in a deep tone. A fan's story of sneaking into her hotel room.
She began to enjoy it.
And laugh like a woman in charge of herself.
DJ Moment
He wanted to surprise her with Cole Porter. Something easy, in his range. Something that Jimmy Stewart got away with.
==
At the radio station, early or late, noone else around, he found her crying. They often did the too-early shifts together, and when needed, the too-late shifts. There was always a lot of coffee and very little light.
"Hey, where's the news?!" He rounded the corner of the cubicle before he saw that her eyes were filled with tears.
She looked away quickly. "It's here, " tearing the sheet off the old fax machine. The slick paper and the purple ink always rubbed off on his hands and he'd stare at his fingers in the control room. Turning knobs, wondering how he'd gone wrong and why he didn't merit his own engineer.
"You're crying!" He declared. He was getting very good at these declarative statements; no matter how early it was, he could still identify reality.
"No," she shook her head, avoiding his eyes. When he came close, she backed away, as if he were going to attack her by giving her a hug. She was still new at being his assistant, and he knew he was failing her. She had introduced herself as a lifelong fan (which only served to make him feel old, not honored. She'd been watching his 22 year old self on tv. The time machine.) And all he ever did was yell. He was an even worse boss.
"Look, I'm sorry if I raise my voice all the time," he was following her down the hallway of carpeted cubicles, back towards the control room.
"It doesn't matter. It's not you," she called over her shoulder.
He heard the record ending, and as always, pondered the size of his listenership. How much dead-air they would take. It might even be his signature style. But he never let it go longer than a few seconds. And he was due for a bunch of business, the ads, the station id, the news.
Instead of chasing her to the Ladies room (he didn't even know her THAT well, yet), he went back to work.
She walked in, just as he was coming back from commercial. Even though he was reading the news off the blurry paper, he felt her eyes on him. He even tried to make eye contact when he could. As soon as he finished reading, he was able to set the next record by feel. His hands moving, carefully in sequence, to get the record moving, to pull up the sound on turntable 2, already cued up. To turn off his mic and the other faders, just in case the used car commercial was repeating itself. He held her eyes, waiting for her to talk.
"When I was a kid, I'd watch your show with my brother. He was a year younger than me. He loved it because I loved it. It was only on in the summer, and we'd go out and play-usually a variation of the plot of whatever show we saw. He was killed when he was 11. Today, it's his birthday. And it marks the same number of years that I had known him as he's been gone. And somehow, even though I know it's not true, I've always throught that you were a witness to him, to us playing together. Like you shared all those mornings. And I'm completely aware that you aren't--"
She stopped talking just as the record finished and he announced the next one. It was their signalling language, nodding to each other when he went back to steering the big ship (The Titanic). He was a pilot, a captain, making sure the music kept rolling on. Silence was the crash, the train wreck.
"That you weren't there. But after he died, I confided to your poster. And it was a great copng mechanism. And I don't expect that in real life----, I just wish that I could cnfide in you and that you would be kind enough to listen. And instead, all you do is yell at me,"
His hand had been resting a few inches from hers, the music was playing, but the room was silent and motionless. He reaches his hand out slightly to rest his fingers on hers. But the music ends abruptly, Something's wrong with the continuity of sound; the great ocean is turbulent again.
She leaves the door slightly ajar, breaking the sanctity of the dj booth, but at this hour, it was only them anyway and no other sound will leak in. The entire office is silent.
==
At the radio station, early or late, noone else around, he found her crying. They often did the too-early shifts together, and when needed, the too-late shifts. There was always a lot of coffee and very little light.
"Hey, where's the news?!" He rounded the corner of the cubicle before he saw that her eyes were filled with tears.
She looked away quickly. "It's here, " tearing the sheet off the old fax machine. The slick paper and the purple ink always rubbed off on his hands and he'd stare at his fingers in the control room. Turning knobs, wondering how he'd gone wrong and why he didn't merit his own engineer.
"You're crying!" He declared. He was getting very good at these declarative statements; no matter how early it was, he could still identify reality.
"No," she shook her head, avoiding his eyes. When he came close, she backed away, as if he were going to attack her by giving her a hug. She was still new at being his assistant, and he knew he was failing her. She had introduced herself as a lifelong fan (which only served to make him feel old, not honored. She'd been watching his 22 year old self on tv. The time machine.) And all he ever did was yell. He was an even worse boss.
"Look, I'm sorry if I raise my voice all the time," he was following her down the hallway of carpeted cubicles, back towards the control room.
"It doesn't matter. It's not you," she called over her shoulder.
He heard the record ending, and as always, pondered the size of his listenership. How much dead-air they would take. It might even be his signature style. But he never let it go longer than a few seconds. And he was due for a bunch of business, the ads, the station id, the news.
Instead of chasing her to the Ladies room (he didn't even know her THAT well, yet), he went back to work.
She walked in, just as he was coming back from commercial. Even though he was reading the news off the blurry paper, he felt her eyes on him. He even tried to make eye contact when he could. As soon as he finished reading, he was able to set the next record by feel. His hands moving, carefully in sequence, to get the record moving, to pull up the sound on turntable 2, already cued up. To turn off his mic and the other faders, just in case the used car commercial was repeating itself. He held her eyes, waiting for her to talk.
"When I was a kid, I'd watch your show with my brother. He was a year younger than me. He loved it because I loved it. It was only on in the summer, and we'd go out and play-usually a variation of the plot of whatever show we saw. He was killed when he was 11. Today, it's his birthday. And it marks the same number of years that I had known him as he's been gone. And somehow, even though I know it's not true, I've always throught that you were a witness to him, to us playing together. Like you shared all those mornings. And I'm completely aware that you aren't--"
She stopped talking just as the record finished and he announced the next one. It was their signalling language, nodding to each other when he went back to steering the big ship (The Titanic). He was a pilot, a captain, making sure the music kept rolling on. Silence was the crash, the train wreck.
"That you weren't there. But after he died, I confided to your poster. And it was a great copng mechanism. And I don't expect that in real life----, I just wish that I could cnfide in you and that you would be kind enough to listen. And instead, all you do is yell at me,"
His hand had been resting a few inches from hers, the music was playing, but the room was silent and motionless. He reaches his hand out slightly to rest his fingers on hers. But the music ends abruptly, Something's wrong with the continuity of sound; the great ocean is turbulent again.
She leaves the door slightly ajar, breaking the sanctity of the dj booth, but at this hour, it was only them anyway and no other sound will leak in. The entire office is silent.
Sunday, May 4, 2014
Shit!
Thoreau's Journal: 04-May-1852
R.W.E. tells me he does not like Haynes as well as I do. I tell him that he makes better manure than most men.
==
After a while, her nap was rudely interrupted.
She hadn't remembered falling asleep, probably something that happened when the music lulled both of them into a lovely quiet space. A lot of ghosts gently entered into the space then, a familiar feeling of love and the old tenderness. Just yesterday, he was stroking her cheek. Some dream of their lovemaking got conjured up and she remembered the hollows and muscles of his body.
But there was something wrong.
"Shit!" he shouted.
She smelt it too.
It wasn't a metaphor or a declaration of frustration. It was literal. Her eyes opened and almost immediately began to water. He had shat himself in the hospital bed in his dining room.
His nurse had called in sick yesterday and the day before. In fact, she was just beginning to regret speaking to her at all when she arrived. She had betrayed him and somehow volunteered herself as his last living caretaker.
His face was turned to the wall, depressed and humiliated. She jumped up, ready for the task.
"No worries, a little shit doesn't scare me. I've heard you sing,"
He smiled at that. When he looked at her, his eyes seemed to be watery. She couldn't tell if it was his age or sickness or if he was starting to cry out of gratitude.
She gave him a tender sponge bath at 3am, running her hands over the body she knew so well. The biceps that had always been so strong (as solid as his prick) were gone, replaced by bone and slippery skin.
She had to resist the urge to kiss all of his old freckles.
She made jokes instead, which was just as good.
Monday, March 24, 2014
I Love The Way You Call Me Baby
Part 1
He's lost, he's tired. They've been driving for miles. She's trying to have an intelligent conversation, full of nervous energy.
As usual, with 40 more miles to go. He needs to pee. All his brain energy is focused on keeping the bladder in check.
"Whatever you say, Baby,"
"Wait. Did you just call me 'Baby' ???"
LONG PAUSE. Careful and considered.
"Whatever it was I didn't mean ta!"
He hopes that by quoting a fragment from a song, he can stop her from exploding. It's the first thing that comes into his mind really, every time he finds himself dealing with a woman who is about to explode. Or a drunk guy at a bar who is eager to punch him. He knows she knows this song. The problem is that he can't remember what song it's from. This puzzles takes up much more brain space than whatever it is she is telling him.
"I can't believe I'm riding around with a guy who uses the word "Baby" in an un-ironic manner. It's like you are trying to infantalize me!"
His ears catch up with his brain: Hang on, did she just say something about an infant? Could she be pregnant?
He looks over at her, hoping to say something brilliant. Pull some great joke out of his ass. He raises an eyebrow.
"You've come a long way? Baby?"
He flashes his characteristic smile.
He breaks her.
She can't help but laugh.
Miraculously, they make it to the gig without him ruining his only clean pair of trousers. Although it was a close call when the owner wanted an autograph before giving directions to the bathroom.
Mary Mary by the Monkees
==
PART 2
Sometime during their Sound Check, she wants to get back at him. She tries teasing him, but he is all focus and frustration. He climbs off the stage to check the balance of the speakers.
She begins to sing tunelessly:
"Don't use that toilet if you have to go to the bathroom during the show. I can hear you onstage"
She manages to whisper it into the mic in a somewhat sultry manner.
He whirls around.
"KEEP SINGING! I need to hear how it sounds!"
Suddenly she's stung, staring back at his words, surprised and suddenly scared, as if he's asked her to strip.
He thinks: She's so stuck up about things. Such a prude. How am I even on tour with someone like her, so uptight all the time?
"Wait, wait, wait. What-what should I sing? You usually . . . "
All her bravado is gone. She's lost without him and his guitar. He knows she HATES singing acapella, and he's being slightly cruel. But he likes it somehow. Maybe he'll throw her a note.
"SHUT UP AND SING!"
Or maybe he'll just yell at her. Sometimes that works too.
With lasers of hatred beaming from her eyes, she begins.
"I'll buy you Rogaine
When you start losing all your hair/
I'll sew on patches/
To all your underwear"
Her eyes. They look so mean, but she has twisted the lyrics out of shape. It's some random hit song on the radio. "Underwear" is clearly her own invention.
"Keep going!' He yells over his shoulder as he walks into the shadows, trying to hide a smirk. But it's too late. They were making fun of the real lines in the song while they were in the car, randomly and not nearly this cleverly. She keeps going until he falls on the floor laughing. And nearly ruins his pants a second time.
==
PART 3
It's a small crowd, but after a full set, he decides it's a perfect time to do an encore. As usual, she has no idea where's he's going with this.
"We have a tradition. MUSICIANS, that is, have a tradition. Of carrying on a great song, of carrying on the tradition." He's very serious. She looks over at him, dubiously. Wondering where her part comes in. If he has decided to include her at all.
"Are WE serious musicians?" She asks, both to him and to the crowd, neither of which takes any of this patter seriously.
But he plows forward. "We, of course, being SERIOUS musicians, WE have followed in the tradition of hearing a song and wanting to make it our own. Excuse me, we take it, make it our own, and thereby-we ruin it. Yes, ladies and gentlemen! We, in particular, LOVE to ruin songs!"
"I have no idea where this is going, but I like it!" She interjects. The audience laughs. They are with them, wherever they are going.
"So here is a song, I'm not even sure what it is called or who sings it, but we heard it on the radio, one of the 'commercial' stations, so it must be a hit,"
"So therefore, we hate it!" Gleefully, she can't let him alone.
"No, no, no. We DON'T hate it. We only ruin songs we LOVE! The songs we hate don't get played at all!"
"RIGHT!" She is all cheer and fun and games at this point, "So, what song IS this? I'm just curious."
"You want to know the song you are going to be singing?" He strums his guitar absentmindedly, like he's a cowboy loading a gun.
"I'M going to be singing?" There's that fear again, just behind her eyes.
"I hope you sing it. I certainly don't know it!" The audience laughs again, a little more uncertainly this time. "Start by singing it straight, and then do what you were doing before. When we were doing the sound check,"
"Oh that. Hmm. Okay...."
He strums a vague intro, and instead of jumping in with a brilliant line, she giggles.
"Wait, I don't think I can sing it straight!! Just play and I'll sing . . ."
"Usually I like to introduce the name of the song we're ruining, but here I'll just assume you guys will recognize this famous hit. Or if we are really lucky, maybe by the end of the night, it'll be a whole NEW song!"
He started again, and this time, miracle of miracles, she came in perfectly.
"I'll knit you Rogaine/
when you stop losing all your hair/
I'll bring you flowers/
for all your underwear"
And it just got worse. But her voice was lovely, and everyone in the audience was drunk, and happy to stay for their private joke, which expanded to include the entire roomful of drunken customers of the bar. And those people who were fed up with the music business, or the "Mucus Business" as he called it, being sold crap as their only option. But it was fun to listen to her, making up endless variations on a theme, vaguely resembling a hit song on the radio, that was too precious anyway.
From that night on, members of the audience would hear the song on the radio and be disappointed that it wasn't her perfect, Dr. Demento version of it. But they would smile anyway.
OTHER VARIATIONS
I'll sew on patches
When you start losing all your hair
I'll buy you flowers
To match your sweater!
I'll buy you flowers
When you start losing all your hair
I'll buy you Rogaine
For all your underwear
I'll buy you Rogaine
To fix your sweater
I'll buy you flowers
To make it better
I'll knit you Rogaine
When you stop losing all your hair
I'll buy you flowers
For all your underwear
Cause I-I-I Love
The way you call me patches
And you-oo-oo-oh
Take me the way I am!
The Way I Am by Ingrid Michaelson
He's lost, he's tired. They've been driving for miles. She's trying to have an intelligent conversation, full of nervous energy.
As usual, with 40 more miles to go. He needs to pee. All his brain energy is focused on keeping the bladder in check.
"Whatever you say, Baby,"
"Wait. Did you just call me 'Baby' ???"
LONG PAUSE. Careful and considered.
"Whatever it was I didn't mean ta!"
He hopes that by quoting a fragment from a song, he can stop her from exploding. It's the first thing that comes into his mind really, every time he finds himself dealing with a woman who is about to explode. Or a drunk guy at a bar who is eager to punch him. He knows she knows this song. The problem is that he can't remember what song it's from. This puzzles takes up much more brain space than whatever it is she is telling him.
"I can't believe I'm riding around with a guy who uses the word "Baby" in an un-ironic manner. It's like you are trying to infantalize me!"
His ears catch up with his brain: Hang on, did she just say something about an infant? Could she be pregnant?
He looks over at her, hoping to say something brilliant. Pull some great joke out of his ass. He raises an eyebrow.
"You've come a long way? Baby?"
He flashes his characteristic smile.
He breaks her.
She can't help but laugh.
Miraculously, they make it to the gig without him ruining his only clean pair of trousers. Although it was a close call when the owner wanted an autograph before giving directions to the bathroom.
Mary Mary by the Monkees
==
PART 2
Sometime during their Sound Check, she wants to get back at him. She tries teasing him, but he is all focus and frustration. He climbs off the stage to check the balance of the speakers.
She begins to sing tunelessly:
"Don't use that toilet if you have to go to the bathroom during the show. I can hear you onstage"
She manages to whisper it into the mic in a somewhat sultry manner.
He whirls around.
"KEEP SINGING! I need to hear how it sounds!"
Suddenly she's stung, staring back at his words, surprised and suddenly scared, as if he's asked her to strip.
He thinks: She's so stuck up about things. Such a prude. How am I even on tour with someone like her, so uptight all the time?
"Wait, wait, wait. What-what should I sing? You usually . . . "
All her bravado is gone. She's lost without him and his guitar. He knows she HATES singing acapella, and he's being slightly cruel. But he likes it somehow. Maybe he'll throw her a note.
"SHUT UP AND SING!"
Or maybe he'll just yell at her. Sometimes that works too.
With lasers of hatred beaming from her eyes, she begins.
"I'll buy you Rogaine
When you start losing all your hair/
I'll sew on patches/
To all your underwear"
Her eyes. They look so mean, but she has twisted the lyrics out of shape. It's some random hit song on the radio. "Underwear" is clearly her own invention.
"Keep going!' He yells over his shoulder as he walks into the shadows, trying to hide a smirk. But it's too late. They were making fun of the real lines in the song while they were in the car, randomly and not nearly this cleverly. She keeps going until he falls on the floor laughing. And nearly ruins his pants a second time.
==
PART 3
It's a small crowd, but after a full set, he decides it's a perfect time to do an encore. As usual, she has no idea where's he's going with this.
"We have a tradition. MUSICIANS, that is, have a tradition. Of carrying on a great song, of carrying on the tradition." He's very serious. She looks over at him, dubiously. Wondering where her part comes in. If he has decided to include her at all.
"Are WE serious musicians?" She asks, both to him and to the crowd, neither of which takes any of this patter seriously.
But he plows forward. "We, of course, being SERIOUS musicians, WE have followed in the tradition of hearing a song and wanting to make it our own. Excuse me, we take it, make it our own, and thereby-we ruin it. Yes, ladies and gentlemen! We, in particular, LOVE to ruin songs!"
"I have no idea where this is going, but I like it!" She interjects. The audience laughs. They are with them, wherever they are going.
"So here is a song, I'm not even sure what it is called or who sings it, but we heard it on the radio, one of the 'commercial' stations, so it must be a hit,"
"So therefore, we hate it!" Gleefully, she can't let him alone.
"No, no, no. We DON'T hate it. We only ruin songs we LOVE! The songs we hate don't get played at all!"
"RIGHT!" She is all cheer and fun and games at this point, "So, what song IS this? I'm just curious."
"You want to know the song you are going to be singing?" He strums his guitar absentmindedly, like he's a cowboy loading a gun.
"I'M going to be singing?" There's that fear again, just behind her eyes.
"I hope you sing it. I certainly don't know it!" The audience laughs again, a little more uncertainly this time. "Start by singing it straight, and then do what you were doing before. When we were doing the sound check,"
"Oh that. Hmm. Okay...."
He strums a vague intro, and instead of jumping in with a brilliant line, she giggles.
"Wait, I don't think I can sing it straight!! Just play and I'll sing . . ."
"Usually I like to introduce the name of the song we're ruining, but here I'll just assume you guys will recognize this famous hit. Or if we are really lucky, maybe by the end of the night, it'll be a whole NEW song!"
He started again, and this time, miracle of miracles, she came in perfectly.
"I'll knit you Rogaine/
when you stop losing all your hair/
I'll bring you flowers/
for all your underwear"
And it just got worse. But her voice was lovely, and everyone in the audience was drunk, and happy to stay for their private joke, which expanded to include the entire roomful of drunken customers of the bar. And those people who were fed up with the music business, or the "Mucus Business" as he called it, being sold crap as their only option. But it was fun to listen to her, making up endless variations on a theme, vaguely resembling a hit song on the radio, that was too precious anyway.
From that night on, members of the audience would hear the song on the radio and be disappointed that it wasn't her perfect, Dr. Demento version of it. But they would smile anyway.
OTHER VARIATIONS
I'll sew on patches
When you start losing all your hair
I'll buy you flowers
To match your sweater!
I'll buy you flowers
When you start losing all your hair
I'll buy you Rogaine
For all your underwear
I'll buy you Rogaine
To fix your sweater
I'll buy you flowers
To make it better
I'll knit you Rogaine
When you stop losing all your hair
I'll buy you flowers
For all your underwear
Cause I-I-I Love
The way you call me patches
And you-oo-oo-oh
Take me the way I am!
The Way I Am by Ingrid Michaelson
Sunday, March 23, 2014
May I Suggest /One more hour of Light
And then it happened.
The crash came. The sound of breaking glass.
He said, "It's over. It's all over."
The guitar fell, smashing into pieces 6 floors below.
She said, "I don't see any reason to stay, either"
They finally had the fight that consumed the last morsel of their love.
And then she laughed.
And he flashed his brilliant smile.
All the anxieties that had been lingering, unspoken, tension that collects in her eyebrows and shoulders. So many moments of feeling bad, of beating yourself up. Regrets, lost moments, hours, days, years. All that awful stuff that lasted too long.
And their eyes fell into harmony again. One simple look, and they could laugh at the world. And themselves.
Because in those darkest moments, when they had lost everything, a single song of laughter saved them.
Looking in his eyes, she felt him holding her in their tent, looking up at the stars.
(The next morning was their least romantic moment; they awoke clumsily groping each other until they could no longer take the moist heat inside the canvas colored oven. Comedy always flipped over the moments when they took themselves too seriously.)
Every moment was a new beginning and was pulled into the past so quickly, eroding their days until their final moments together. On their first tour. Their last moments onstage together. The last time they sang. Their last moments together.
==
(Back to the present)
She lay smiling, feeling the strange gravel under her wrist. Hearing the music playing, thank god the music was still on. Although it was probably a hallucination.
God, she hated goodbyes.
But she felt a sleepiness approaching. Something like a stage going dark. Like that afternoon at the valley festival, watching the sun setting over the hillside. Lying down on a camping pad, almost vertical on the hill. His arm around her shoulder for a pillow.
She was dreaming of a harmony, so sweet, so beautiful, she needed to wake up and get it down! But she couldn't move, her limbs had been rearranged somehow and down was up and everything was vice versa. The parts that she could move felt weighed down and the parts she couldn't feel made her feel free.
God, the harmony was gorgeous. She couldn't tell if she was tearing up or if her vision was shifting too. Maybe she was drowning . . . but no, the highway wasn't under water. The gravel under her wrist, the tiny pebbles hurt her wrist as she moved her hand. She was trapped between her rental car and the road.
And wasn't going to get out.
Damn, just her luck to have a fatal accident and not have HIM in the car. HE wanted to die. She, she was fine with life. So many things left undone .... well, the thing that was the worst was not being able to write down this harmony that she was hearing. Or to be able to sing it with him.
With that, the tears came. She opened her mouth to sing.
And that was all.
May I Suggest To You by Susan Werner (video)
Susan Werner and Red Molly (video with crickets)
The crash came. The sound of breaking glass.
He said, "It's over. It's all over."
The guitar fell, smashing into pieces 6 floors below.
She said, "I don't see any reason to stay, either"
They finally had the fight that consumed the last morsel of their love.
And then she laughed.
And he flashed his brilliant smile.
All the anxieties that had been lingering, unspoken, tension that collects in her eyebrows and shoulders. So many moments of feeling bad, of beating yourself up. Regrets, lost moments, hours, days, years. All that awful stuff that lasted too long.
And their eyes fell into harmony again. One simple look, and they could laugh at the world. And themselves.
Because in those darkest moments, when they had lost everything, a single song of laughter saved them.
Looking in his eyes, she felt him holding her in their tent, looking up at the stars.
(The next morning was their least romantic moment; they awoke clumsily groping each other until they could no longer take the moist heat inside the canvas colored oven. Comedy always flipped over the moments when they took themselves too seriously.)
Every moment was a new beginning and was pulled into the past so quickly, eroding their days until their final moments together. On their first tour. Their last moments onstage together. The last time they sang. Their last moments together.
==
(Back to the present)
She lay smiling, feeling the strange gravel under her wrist. Hearing the music playing, thank god the music was still on. Although it was probably a hallucination.
God, she hated goodbyes.
But she felt a sleepiness approaching. Something like a stage going dark. Like that afternoon at the valley festival, watching the sun setting over the hillside. Lying down on a camping pad, almost vertical on the hill. His arm around her shoulder for a pillow.
She was dreaming of a harmony, so sweet, so beautiful, she needed to wake up and get it down! But she couldn't move, her limbs had been rearranged somehow and down was up and everything was vice versa. The parts that she could move felt weighed down and the parts she couldn't feel made her feel free.
God, the harmony was gorgeous. She couldn't tell if she was tearing up or if her vision was shifting too. Maybe she was drowning . . . but no, the highway wasn't under water. The gravel under her wrist, the tiny pebbles hurt her wrist as she moved her hand. She was trapped between her rental car and the road.
And wasn't going to get out.
Damn, just her luck to have a fatal accident and not have HIM in the car. HE wanted to die. She, she was fine with life. So many things left undone .... well, the thing that was the worst was not being able to write down this harmony that she was hearing. Or to be able to sing it with him.
With that, the tears came. She opened her mouth to sing.
And that was all.
May I Suggest To You by Susan Werner (video)
Susan Werner and Red Molly (video with crickets)
Sunday, March 16, 2014
And never know each other
She was always amazed by the crowds when they were deep in the Magic.
She doubted him at the beginning of every set, but kept the faith as each note was released into the air.
The view from the stage was into a canyon of the universe, stars flashing, ablaze, repeatedly, supernovas dying and being reborn within the chaos.
Why were they taking pictures of him? And Them? Aka The Band, aka the Group, aka the Monsters, aka the Cash Cows, they were the same-even after 40 years. Minute differences in shading from one year to the next were unworthy of such careful documentation.
Walking through the crowds at the convention, she saw scrapbooks of their shared histories. Fans taking pictures side by side. A calendar montage from a movie from 1939. And a constant reminder of how the body and the soul age at different rates. Flip. Dorian Gray. Flip. Dorian Gray. Flip. Dorian Gray.
There was a spontaneous gathering and sing along in the lobby of the hotel. She watched from the balcony; bodies not accustomed to dancing freely, voices strong with song. Her camera froze them into rapturous statues.
She ran backstage to show him and the other guys. But he was bored. They were bored.
Even the Pope gets jaded.
The green room was Waiting for Godot.
She doubted him at the beginning of every set, but kept the faith as each note was released into the air.
The view from the stage was into a canyon of the universe, stars flashing, ablaze, repeatedly, supernovas dying and being reborn within the chaos.
Why were they taking pictures of him? And Them? Aka The Band, aka the Group, aka the Monsters, aka the Cash Cows, they were the same-even after 40 years. Minute differences in shading from one year to the next were unworthy of such careful documentation.
Walking through the crowds at the convention, she saw scrapbooks of their shared histories. Fans taking pictures side by side. A calendar montage from a movie from 1939. And a constant reminder of how the body and the soul age at different rates. Flip. Dorian Gray. Flip. Dorian Gray. Flip. Dorian Gray.
There was a spontaneous gathering and sing along in the lobby of the hotel. She watched from the balcony; bodies not accustomed to dancing freely, voices strong with song. Her camera froze them into rapturous statues.
She ran backstage to show him and the other guys. But he was bored. They were bored.
Even the Pope gets jaded.
The green room was Waiting for Godot.
Saturday, March 15, 2014
I'm disappointed in the taste.
Who am I to want something?
"I'm disappointed in the taste?"
So someone will just be summoned by the ring of a bell, and D will get a new cup of coffee. And he will pay them with a smile, and they will see him posing moodily by the glass door, on his boxers.
But that was me in another life. The scared boy, the humble servant. Offering up the item that was desired and of higher value than my own person. And then running away, backing away.
And somehow my special spark, the music talent, got plucked out of obscurity. There are a million other boys with cute smiles that this may have happened to, but it was me.
The cameras will convince you that you are a god. A minor deity. But experience will teach you otherwise. You will find yourself, again and again. In talented guitarists, in shy, beautiful boys, in funny sour loners. Why wasn't it them,
I still have to remind myself that I am the
Rock God. Or at least playing the role.
She, poor girl, she is caught up in the depression too. A sense of general worthlessness, compounded by the feeling of not being effective in the world.
I understand how to emerge from my own, but not to help her out of hers.
"I'm disappointed in the taste?"
So someone will just be summoned by the ring of a bell, and D will get a new cup of coffee. And he will pay them with a smile, and they will see him posing moodily by the glass door, on his boxers.
But that was me in another life. The scared boy, the humble servant. Offering up the item that was desired and of higher value than my own person. And then running away, backing away.
And somehow my special spark, the music talent, got plucked out of obscurity. There are a million other boys with cute smiles that this may have happened to, but it was me.
The cameras will convince you that you are a god. A minor deity. But experience will teach you otherwise. You will find yourself, again and again. In talented guitarists, in shy, beautiful boys, in funny sour loners. Why wasn't it them,
I still have to remind myself that I am the
Rock God. Or at least playing the role.
She, poor girl, she is caught up in the depression too. A sense of general worthlessness, compounded by the feeling of not being effective in the world.
I understand how to emerge from my own, but not to help her out of hers.
Sunday, March 2, 2014
Life Was No Prize
He had always believed in not crying during a performance. Overacting, cheap tricks. It comes off as insincere, no matter what.
But there was one night, after a long fight, after losing their love and regaining it again. They were onstage, and she sang an old standard. He brought it in for the Beatles reference. (He had mixed it up with "Till there was you", "I never sawr them ringing") Something about not knowing. It's all the same isn't it?
So she sang it.
And that night, she heard it completely sincerely. Realizing how wondrous the lyrics were, and she felt everything just at that second. He wondered if he should stop her, when he saw her trembling. But his first instinct was to look at the audience. They were rapt. Enraptured in her.
He began to cry as well. At her basic sincerity. At the idea that it was HIS love she was singing about. At the idea that he could change someone so fundamentally with the GOOD part of himself. And of course, how she had influenced him. How she had sculpted him into a beautiful version of himself.
She taught him how to be generous. Not the jealous love of his former blond skinny girlfriends, who would resent him talking to anyone (no matter if they were the prettiest in the room, they always had the biggest insecurities over their looks. As they aged, revenge did not turn sweet. Only bitter, as they were bewildered by the lack of attention)
She made him feel like everyone around them was in love too. The band, the audience, strangers they'd meet in their travels. Even when she wanted to keep him to herself, she'd let him go. He always wanted to come back to her, to be in her presence. Even more than music, her aura was the one tangible thing to him. The one clear magnet in his life.
The sheer randomness of love and luck, and how inevitable it all was.
And how scary it was to imagine a life without her. And how tenuous it was, even at that very moment. How every moment seemed to be touch and go. Or touch and stay. How likely it was that she'd walk out on him any second, so he needed to walk first.
She looked at him, to hand the solo over to him. And their eyes met, and he turned away immediately. Tears falling on his guitar. Damn, he couldn't take it. But he told her in the solo. "You are the single best thing that's ever happened to me, onstage or off. With you, I've hit the lottery."
Driving home that night, she wasn't sure if she knew what time it was yet. And that it was getting very late, too late to figure it out. More of her life was spent in that hovering place, just about to figure things out. Maybe. Maybe it was right next to her. Maybe it was still out there for her.
How amazing to be sitting next to a man who plays like that. To sing to him and to the audiences; to be in just the right magic time and space to make that kind of music. It didn't matter who heard. Even she didn't hear what she was singing. And so took it for granted. And was distracted by all the gear, setup and breakdown and getting lost in the wilds of New Jersey.
Life was no prize.
Still.
Nancy Lamott-I Didn't Know What Time It Was
But there was one night, after a long fight, after losing their love and regaining it again. They were onstage, and she sang an old standard. He brought it in for the Beatles reference. (He had mixed it up with "Till there was you", "I never sawr them ringing") Something about not knowing. It's all the same isn't it?
So she sang it.
And that night, she heard it completely sincerely. Realizing how wondrous the lyrics were, and she felt everything just at that second. He wondered if he should stop her, when he saw her trembling. But his first instinct was to look at the audience. They were rapt. Enraptured in her.
He began to cry as well. At her basic sincerity. At the idea that it was HIS love she was singing about. At the idea that he could change someone so fundamentally with the GOOD part of himself. And of course, how she had influenced him. How she had sculpted him into a beautiful version of himself.
She taught him how to be generous. Not the jealous love of his former blond skinny girlfriends, who would resent him talking to anyone (no matter if they were the prettiest in the room, they always had the biggest insecurities over their looks. As they aged, revenge did not turn sweet. Only bitter, as they were bewildered by the lack of attention)
She made him feel like everyone around them was in love too. The band, the audience, strangers they'd meet in their travels. Even when she wanted to keep him to herself, she'd let him go. He always wanted to come back to her, to be in her presence. Even more than music, her aura was the one tangible thing to him. The one clear magnet in his life.
The sheer randomness of love and luck, and how inevitable it all was.
And how scary it was to imagine a life without her. And how tenuous it was, even at that very moment. How every moment seemed to be touch and go. Or touch and stay. How likely it was that she'd walk out on him any second, so he needed to walk first.
She looked at him, to hand the solo over to him. And their eyes met, and he turned away immediately. Tears falling on his guitar. Damn, he couldn't take it. But he told her in the solo. "You are the single best thing that's ever happened to me, onstage or off. With you, I've hit the lottery."
Driving home that night, she wasn't sure if she knew what time it was yet. And that it was getting very late, too late to figure it out. More of her life was spent in that hovering place, just about to figure things out. Maybe. Maybe it was right next to her. Maybe it was still out there for her.
How amazing to be sitting next to a man who plays like that. To sing to him and to the audiences; to be in just the right magic time and space to make that kind of music. It didn't matter who heard. Even she didn't hear what she was singing. And so took it for granted. And was distracted by all the gear, setup and breakdown and getting lost in the wilds of New Jersey.
Life was no prize.
Still.
Nancy Lamott-I Didn't Know What Time It Was
Wednesday, February 5, 2014
Every junkie's like a setting sun
They woke up to terrible news.
Again.
He had known the man for 40 years. An addiction that had been fought and won, and then this, the surprise relapse. Being caught in the headlights, the tiny miscalculation. They used to get high together, in the casual, trippy Canyon-Valley days. Watching the trees in the rain turn into seaweed.
Now, outside the hotel room, there was ice and snow covering the trees. He was glad they didn't have to go anywhere today. Glad to wrap themselves in fancy hotel blankets and have food delivered.
The radio was on, the recurring headline. "Found with a needle in his arm". He looked out the window and tried not to think. Everything was delicately, painfully beautiful. The branches covered in ice reminded him of syringes. Endless, everywhere, dangling, teasing him with their innocence.
His own addiction and recovery and relapse, hidden and secret and tenuous. She had no idea. And he was so careful to make sure she never knew. How close he had come so many times.
The time they were loading the truck and the guitar was balanced on the edge of the wall. Knocking it and catching it as it nearly fell the 6 stories. The knot in the stomach, you going over with the guitar in the air. Seeing it fall and catching it, oh the good grasp, lucky and random, pulling a success out of fate.
Driving through the snowstorm, visions of sliding at 60 miles an hour, a solid chestnut tree awaiting the impact. The car in front stopping too quickly, your heart stops. You swerve, always almost too late. Knowing that one day, it will happen and your reaction will be too slow.
She had seen this guy once in person, an intimate concert. Had remarked how touched she was by his voice, as if it created its own microclimate. His voice brought her back to the tiny cabin in the woods, vacations with her parents, when things were happy.
He told her stories, and she, polite audience that she was, listened deep into the night. He kept talking as he could hear her gently snoring.
He knew it was an accident. Anticipation and beautiful hunger for this imminent period of creativity. Floating, swimming, hearing music in your own breath. The last time he had spoken to The Voice, there was excitement about getting back into the studio.
Her breathing had turned quiet.
The Needle and the Damage Done by Neil Young
http://www.lyricsfreak.com/n/neil+young/the+needle+the+damage+done_20099058.html
Again.
He had known the man for 40 years. An addiction that had been fought and won, and then this, the surprise relapse. Being caught in the headlights, the tiny miscalculation. They used to get high together, in the casual, trippy Canyon-Valley days. Watching the trees in the rain turn into seaweed.
Now, outside the hotel room, there was ice and snow covering the trees. He was glad they didn't have to go anywhere today. Glad to wrap themselves in fancy hotel blankets and have food delivered.
The radio was on, the recurring headline. "Found with a needle in his arm". He looked out the window and tried not to think. Everything was delicately, painfully beautiful. The branches covered in ice reminded him of syringes. Endless, everywhere, dangling, teasing him with their innocence.
His own addiction and recovery and relapse, hidden and secret and tenuous. She had no idea. And he was so careful to make sure she never knew. How close he had come so many times.
The time they were loading the truck and the guitar was balanced on the edge of the wall. Knocking it and catching it as it nearly fell the 6 stories. The knot in the stomach, you going over with the guitar in the air. Seeing it fall and catching it, oh the good grasp, lucky and random, pulling a success out of fate.
Driving through the snowstorm, visions of sliding at 60 miles an hour, a solid chestnut tree awaiting the impact. The car in front stopping too quickly, your heart stops. You swerve, always almost too late. Knowing that one day, it will happen and your reaction will be too slow.
She had seen this guy once in person, an intimate concert. Had remarked how touched she was by his voice, as if it created its own microclimate. His voice brought her back to the tiny cabin in the woods, vacations with her parents, when things were happy.
He told her stories, and she, polite audience that she was, listened deep into the night. He kept talking as he could hear her gently snoring.
He knew it was an accident. Anticipation and beautiful hunger for this imminent period of creativity. Floating, swimming, hearing music in your own breath. The last time he had spoken to The Voice, there was excitement about getting back into the studio.
Her breathing had turned quiet.
The Needle and the Damage Done by Neil Young
http://www.lyricsfreak.com/n/neil+young/the+needle+the+damage+done_20099058.html
Saturday, February 1, 2014
Gone To Graveyards, Every One
When he first left home to join the fresh faced kids in Greenwich Village, he was not only going after what was cool, but also what seemed important. It was important to understand, but not ally yourself, with the workers. You were an ARTIST, with a capital ART. Too many of the kids who came from the upper classes were trying to distance themselves from their parents and too many of the kids from the working class were trying to aspire to the arts. But the class divides were pretty thinly drawn.
As much as you wanted to be magnanimous, anyone who asked for money too often was a drag.
He felt the sense that his parents were from both the intellectual class and the hard-working class, but not the rich class. They also were atheist in the way that they believed in personal spiritual enlightenment. Their churches and temples were replaced with patchouli, scarves and incense. Scripture was replaced by streetcorner prophets and faith in the voices in their heads.
Turning the corner from Avenue A, off of Thompkins Square Park, he found himself walking west across East 7th Street, his coat too thin and his shoes too worn, he thought about his friends who kept repeating a certain word like an incantation. "Paradise on Earth is", "He went there and now everyone wants to sleep with him, boys and girls", "Sunshine and beaches as far as the eye can see"
California. California. California.
He was running out of money. As in, he didn't have enough money for aspirin for the hangovers he'd get in the mornings and his upstairs neighbors started belly dancing. Even his Salvation Army budget was too low to get another sweater when the temperature dropped this quickly. A sweater or a meal. Even then, he was still living off ketchup soup and other depressing Depression meals taught to him by his grandfather. And his apartment didn't have heat. He'd gladly sing and march against his own landlord, but he was never around. And all his friends seemed to only gather around him in the cafes, wanting company on their terrible songs and even worse voices.
Before he got to 2nd Avenue, he had a revelation.
California. California. California.
He had come to the Village to sing with Pete Seeger and anyone else who might still be Blacklisted. To be the next Bob Dylan. Or at least the next Tiny Tim. He wasn't sure yet who he was, but he knew he was SOMEBODY and was tired of trying all the different versions of himself out. At first he'd come onstage with a serious reverence for the cause and sing every song he knew (which was maybe 5 for this crowd). But the crowd just glared at him and the hat that was passed seemed very light. Not even enough for a pity drink. Somehow the girls dressed in black and their boyfriends looked right through him. But the night he dropped his guitar and nearly knocked out some of the people in the front row, they woke up. Maybe it was a matter of making sure he didn't spill anything on them, but they kept their eyes on him. He tried to make a joke, something self-effacing. Playing the dummy. Happens to everyone.
The hat was full that night. He even got dollar bills.
And so the next night, he pretended to drop his guitar, and with the clumsiness of someone trying to pretend to be clumsy, he showed a certain vulnerability. Just when he had thought that he had failed, a girl tried to chat him up after his set.
A year later, he was an expert at playing the dummy. But the smart one. The one who knew politics and only said things that the real idiots were too stupid to think of (SCENE) Burns and Allen would've been proud of him, getting laughs on jokes they didn't even write but which they somehow taught him over the radio in his mother's kitchen.
He had come to NYC with a banjo on his knee, determined to take over the Folk Music world. It was the only thing he left for his upstairs neighbor the morning after he bedded her. Never shit where you live. And never fool around with your neighbor, she can see every girl you bring in after her. That's why he waited until his last night in New York. Plus his landlord was waiting for him in his apartment.
California. California. California.
There was a carfull of his friends leaving the next morning and he decided to be on it. THe night before was his last folk singing night (even though he didn't know) He had got his guitar out of hock and didn't want to be burdened with two instruments.
Maybe she could take up the banjo. There was only so far you could go with bellydancing.
Where Have All The Flowers Gone? Pete Seeger
As much as you wanted to be magnanimous, anyone who asked for money too often was a drag.
He felt the sense that his parents were from both the intellectual class and the hard-working class, but not the rich class. They also were atheist in the way that they believed in personal spiritual enlightenment. Their churches and temples were replaced with patchouli, scarves and incense. Scripture was replaced by streetcorner prophets and faith in the voices in their heads.
Turning the corner from Avenue A, off of Thompkins Square Park, he found himself walking west across East 7th Street, his coat too thin and his shoes too worn, he thought about his friends who kept repeating a certain word like an incantation. "Paradise on Earth is", "He went there and now everyone wants to sleep with him, boys and girls", "Sunshine and beaches as far as the eye can see"
California. California. California.
He was running out of money. As in, he didn't have enough money for aspirin for the hangovers he'd get in the mornings and his upstairs neighbors started belly dancing. Even his Salvation Army budget was too low to get another sweater when the temperature dropped this quickly. A sweater or a meal. Even then, he was still living off ketchup soup and other depressing Depression meals taught to him by his grandfather. And his apartment didn't have heat. He'd gladly sing and march against his own landlord, but he was never around. And all his friends seemed to only gather around him in the cafes, wanting company on their terrible songs and even worse voices.
Before he got to 2nd Avenue, he had a revelation.
California. California. California.
He had come to the Village to sing with Pete Seeger and anyone else who might still be Blacklisted. To be the next Bob Dylan. Or at least the next Tiny Tim. He wasn't sure yet who he was, but he knew he was SOMEBODY and was tired of trying all the different versions of himself out. At first he'd come onstage with a serious reverence for the cause and sing every song he knew (which was maybe 5 for this crowd). But the crowd just glared at him and the hat that was passed seemed very light. Not even enough for a pity drink. Somehow the girls dressed in black and their boyfriends looked right through him. But the night he dropped his guitar and nearly knocked out some of the people in the front row, they woke up. Maybe it was a matter of making sure he didn't spill anything on them, but they kept their eyes on him. He tried to make a joke, something self-effacing. Playing the dummy. Happens to everyone.
The hat was full that night. He even got dollar bills.
And so the next night, he pretended to drop his guitar, and with the clumsiness of someone trying to pretend to be clumsy, he showed a certain vulnerability. Just when he had thought that he had failed, a girl tried to chat him up after his set.
A year later, he was an expert at playing the dummy. But the smart one. The one who knew politics and only said things that the real idiots were too stupid to think of (SCENE) Burns and Allen would've been proud of him, getting laughs on jokes they didn't even write but which they somehow taught him over the radio in his mother's kitchen.
He had come to NYC with a banjo on his knee, determined to take over the Folk Music world. It was the only thing he left for his upstairs neighbor the morning after he bedded her. Never shit where you live. And never fool around with your neighbor, she can see every girl you bring in after her. That's why he waited until his last night in New York. Plus his landlord was waiting for him in his apartment.
California. California. California.
There was a carfull of his friends leaving the next morning and he decided to be on it. THe night before was his last folk singing night (even though he didn't know) He had got his guitar out of hock and didn't want to be burdened with two instruments.
Maybe she could take up the banjo. There was only so far you could go with bellydancing.
Where Have All The Flowers Gone? Pete Seeger
Tuesday, January 28, 2014
I've Got A Song To Sing
Another one died.
It was a cold winter. The temperatures were below normal, below tolerable. Walks which were beautiful in the snow and ice were now painful.
For many, it was A Time To Die. Like in Ecclesiastes, a time for everything. And you knew that if you just kept moving, you'd make it to a time when the earth had melted. But at a time when the only comfort was the thought of a warmer world, it was hard to sing.
And that's why he got her out of bed. Before she could protest. Even when her voice was in shreds from tears (and so was his), he kept nudging her to sing. Louder. Keep going.
He knew her natural inclination was to depression (as was his). But she was there, and so there was a reason to keep fighting.
They could collapse later (it was their silent motto). But to find out, first thing in the morning, that THIS great man had died was too much for either of them to take alone.
They kept singing.
Pete Seeger, If I Had A Hammer
It was a cold winter. The temperatures were below normal, below tolerable. Walks which were beautiful in the snow and ice were now painful.
For many, it was A Time To Die. Like in Ecclesiastes, a time for everything. And you knew that if you just kept moving, you'd make it to a time when the earth had melted. But at a time when the only comfort was the thought of a warmer world, it was hard to sing.
And that's why he got her out of bed. Before she could protest. Even when her voice was in shreds from tears (and so was his), he kept nudging her to sing. Louder. Keep going.
He knew her natural inclination was to depression (as was his). But she was there, and so there was a reason to keep fighting.
They could collapse later (it was their silent motto). But to find out, first thing in the morning, that THIS great man had died was too much for either of them to take alone.
They kept singing.
Pete Seeger, If I Had A Hammer
Sunday, January 26, 2014
Some Have Gone and Some Remain
Early on, he was an asshole.
Her first few encounters with the old guy whose young smile had adorned her bedroom walls, were disappointing to say the least.
Sexist request #1-someone else she liked, who cried
Sexist insult/yell #2- someone who didn't care
And one day she had a conversation with someone
"it's his complex, not yours"
(JIM? She liked him when he wasn't trying to pull of the gruff exterior.
Sexist remark, when they were trying to cut a commercial. He needed a woman's voice.
I should have someone else doing this for me
"Don't look at me, I'm just the talent here,"
Shrugs, he smiles. They crack up.
It certainly helped their friendship that everytime they got annoyed with each other, the world would jump in and offer a joke.
During a formal fight/breaking the ice
Some guy watering his lawn with a hose with his upstage hand.
"See that guy peeing on his front lawn?"
==
He's driving everyone in the van, HENRY. Hoping they'll make it to the pizza place (she made the wrong reservation, at the wrong place, 20 miles in the wrong direction.
She picked a final request (so proud of herself)
He gets mad.
"Now everyone will think we slept together!"
"That shouldn't bother you, Mr. Lothario!"
I do try to keep some buts of my life respectable. I'm not one of those guys who's looking to get laid just because my wife left me. Certainly not with the likes of you!
"intern" was still a bad word. So was Monica Lewinsky.
In My Life
Her first few encounters with the old guy whose young smile had adorned her bedroom walls, were disappointing to say the least.
Sexist request #1-someone else she liked, who cried
Sexist insult/yell #2- someone who didn't care
And one day she had a conversation with someone
"it's his complex, not yours"
(JIM? She liked him when he wasn't trying to pull of the gruff exterior.
Sexist remark, when they were trying to cut a commercial. He needed a woman's voice.
I should have someone else doing this for me
"Don't look at me, I'm just the talent here,"
Shrugs, he smiles. They crack up.
It certainly helped their friendship that everytime they got annoyed with each other, the world would jump in and offer a joke.
During a formal fight/breaking the ice
Some guy watering his lawn with a hose with his upstage hand.
"See that guy peeing on his front lawn?"
==
He's driving everyone in the van, HENRY. Hoping they'll make it to the pizza place (she made the wrong reservation, at the wrong place, 20 miles in the wrong direction.
She picked a final request (so proud of herself)
He gets mad.
"Now everyone will think we slept together!"
"That shouldn't bother you, Mr. Lothario!"
I do try to keep some buts of my life respectable. I'm not one of those guys who's looking to get laid just because my wife left me. Certainly not with the likes of you!
"intern" was still a bad word. So was Monica Lewinsky.
In My Life
Sharing Horizons that Are New To Us
Some nights, most nights, he'd make sure to include a solo guitar break for himself.
Some nights, it was him showing off. Just being flashy because he could. He still had it all in his fingers.
But some nights, he had his band with him, and he'd step aside to let the better guy do it. And that's when she found him "tangled in his Telacaster". When he found himself lost among the chords.
She closed her eyes and could hear the guitar spin yarns about that girl with the wavy blonde hair, all the way down to her butt. Rapunzel. And that girl in the harem costume. Waves of wigs, wiggling hips. And that hair spread out on the bed. "Golden Hair Across Your Face"
She heard all sorts of places they were. That funny little intersection that night in Irvine, was it a school, was it a detour? Driving into LA at 5am, him so sleepy beside her. The horizon line red with early morning and the ocean to their left.
Getting lost in Lexington, the proposal that never happened. Blaming him and not blaming him. She was not blaming him these days.
The glory of Bamff.
All these sights that he must've seen in his life, repeatedly. And how big the state of North America wa to them.
Once upon a time, he had declared touring to be one long, dark tunnel, with brief moments of light. When you are onstage, blinded and suddenly in front of thousands, hundreds, dozens. Someone. Waiting to hear you play.
She heard him play a chord and repeatedly visit it, go back to tickle it again. "The long road stretches out ahead, a half a million miles"
She thinks of all the horizons and view through their shared windshield.
She thinks of all the familiar places she's driven through. How some roads feel like train tracks, groove worn in them so deeply that to vary an inch seems impossible. She thinks of the specific emotion of pulling up to the view of your house, or your friend's house. Or the house where you grew up. For the millionth time, for the last time. For the first time in years.
If the car is their only home, if they know its view better than they know the driveway of the house, if they know how it feels to ride side by side, then everywhere is home to them.
She thinks that this view, from the stage is getting to be familiar to her, that the tunnel of her life is all in shadows. That the back of his head, his thinning hair caught in the spotlight, is the sight of her home. And she wonders where his home is. If he ever has one. Or appreciates it when he finds it.
"We've Only Just Begun" Stevie Wonder
Some nights, it was him showing off. Just being flashy because he could. He still had it all in his fingers.
But some nights, he had his band with him, and he'd step aside to let the better guy do it. And that's when she found him "tangled in his Telacaster". When he found himself lost among the chords.
She closed her eyes and could hear the guitar spin yarns about that girl with the wavy blonde hair, all the way down to her butt. Rapunzel. And that girl in the harem costume. Waves of wigs, wiggling hips. And that hair spread out on the bed. "Golden Hair Across Your Face"
She heard all sorts of places they were. That funny little intersection that night in Irvine, was it a school, was it a detour? Driving into LA at 5am, him so sleepy beside her. The horizon line red with early morning and the ocean to their left.
Getting lost in Lexington, the proposal that never happened. Blaming him and not blaming him. She was not blaming him these days.
The glory of Bamff.
All these sights that he must've seen in his life, repeatedly. And how big the state of North America wa to them.
Once upon a time, he had declared touring to be one long, dark tunnel, with brief moments of light. When you are onstage, blinded and suddenly in front of thousands, hundreds, dozens. Someone. Waiting to hear you play.
She heard him play a chord and repeatedly visit it, go back to tickle it again. "The long road stretches out ahead, a half a million miles"
She thinks of all the horizons and view through their shared windshield.
She thinks of all the familiar places she's driven through. How some roads feel like train tracks, groove worn in them so deeply that to vary an inch seems impossible. She thinks of the specific emotion of pulling up to the view of your house, or your friend's house. Or the house where you grew up. For the millionth time, for the last time. For the first time in years.
If the car is their only home, if they know its view better than they know the driveway of the house, if they know how it feels to ride side by side, then everywhere is home to them.
She thinks that this view, from the stage is getting to be familiar to her, that the tunnel of her life is all in shadows. That the back of his head, his thinning hair caught in the spotlight, is the sight of her home. And she wonders where his home is. If he ever has one. Or appreciates it when he finds it.
"We've Only Just Begun" Stevie Wonder
Tuesday, January 21, 2014
When I Was Young/ I'd Listen to the Radio . . .
DJ TIME-ON THE AIR
Funny for her to get sentimental about a memory of a memory.
She knew the "sha-la-las" and "shing-a-ling-a-ling" referred to the Oldies-Oldies songs on Oldies 103. The 50's Do-Wop that they'd drop from their format entirely in the new century.
As an only child, she was the daughter of a mother whose musical taste was simple; she had four songs in her repertoire. American songs had first emigrated to her island on newly invented phonograph records of the twenties. 30 years later, crooners were still singing "Button Up Your Overcoat" on the Victrola. The war planes flying overhead during WWII, found her singing "Don't Sit Under The Apple Tree", while she herself ate nispheras and other "exotic" fruits that only grew in tropical zones like Florida and California. Having come to America, still optimistic at 33, her mother had expected streets paved with gold, or at the very least, the Reader's Digest version of life. Doris Day sang "Que Sera Sera" and she echoed the sentiment. She knew about the early Beatles, the group that was a hit in Europe, before they came to America and "got crazy". She'd sing the closest thing to a lullabye to her baby, "Listen, Do-Wah-Do, Do you Want To Know A Secret?" and pour out all her grief and sorrow to her little girl. Teaching her a few "face" words in Portuguese, Lingua, Nariz, Olhos, Boca, Cara. The secret was she wanted to be back in Portugal.
Her father's favorite singer was Judy Collins. But that was all hearsay. "He had died when she was young" (a phrase she heard herself saying so often that she thought she should put it to music). He left behind no records of his own.
She didn't get a stereo of her own until after he died. It was a radio, PLUS a record player, PLUS a tape deck to record off of the previous two. She dated her musical life from the point she could tape her favorite songs off the radio and borrow records from the library. That and her walkman meant she could listen to her tape of Judy Collins asking them to send in the clowns a million times without ever understanding what it was about. But logging it in her memory banks for later translation.
There were commercials on television about these songs she heard on Oldies 103, during the Burns and Allen Show, during the Danny Thomas Show, during Leave it to Beaver and I Dream of Jeannie. Hits of the 50's, Solid Gold of the 60's, spliced into new songs-so you couldn't tell which notes belonged to which songs. The ultimate mix-tape.
And then there was a commercial about The Carpenters. From the way the announcer talked about them, you could tell there was tragedy. Were they a couple? Was it a murder-suicide? Did he die young like her father? The songs were so beautiful, and she NEVER heard them on the radio-were they banned? (Was the tragedy as bad as Charles Manson?) Or just forgotten? She snuck a check from her mother's secret hiding place and sent $19.95 plus shipping and handling for a two record or cassette set, featuring the Carpenters. She chose cassettes because they were easier to hide.
She brought them on the road trip to Quabbin Reservoir, she brought them to San Jose. She listened to them instead of listening to the grown-ups talk. She was a teenager anyway, a decade or two off.
When she found out the true story, that she had been listening to the Patron Saint of Anorexics, she got into the habit of not eating whenever their songs came on. It fit right in with her own lifestyle. She could go for 4 days without eating, and even then, she had stopped because of a mental block, not because she was hungry.
Somehow, the radio began playing Carpenter songs whenever they were in a diner.
"Aren't you gonna eat? You just said you were starving!"
"Um, no. I'm not hungry anymore," staring at the luscious hamburger on her plate.
"Is she finished?" asked the waitress.
"I guess. Don't you want to wrap it up?"
Karen wouldn't want you to. SHE wouldn't eat a hamburger.
"Um, no thank you. I'm done,"
The combination of Catholic School teaching the virtues of suffering and the holy voice of Karen would confuse her for decades.
She never starved herself down to her ideal weight, even when she stopped eating. So she figured she might as well treat food like other people did. But she'd stop everytime she heard Karen's voice coming over the loudspeakers. Karen would want you to enjoy everything this life had to offer.
Nothing tastes as good as thin.
Thin tastes like death.
Food=Life=Sensual Pleasures=Music=Sex=Life (Good and Bad)
She was learning from a ghost to remember the old music fondly. A memory once removed. Remembering herself, remembering Karen remembering the Do-Wop from the 50's.
"Those old memories/ still sound so good to me . . . "
"Aren't you gonna eat your hamburger?"
"I think I'll save it for later,"
The Carpenters, featuring Karen Carpenter, Yesterday Once More
Funny for her to get sentimental about a memory of a memory.
She knew the "sha-la-las" and "shing-a-ling-a-ling" referred to the Oldies-Oldies songs on Oldies 103. The 50's Do-Wop that they'd drop from their format entirely in the new century.
As an only child, she was the daughter of a mother whose musical taste was simple; she had four songs in her repertoire. American songs had first emigrated to her island on newly invented phonograph records of the twenties. 30 years later, crooners were still singing "Button Up Your Overcoat" on the Victrola. The war planes flying overhead during WWII, found her singing "Don't Sit Under The Apple Tree", while she herself ate nispheras and other "exotic" fruits that only grew in tropical zones like Florida and California. Having come to America, still optimistic at 33, her mother had expected streets paved with gold, or at the very least, the Reader's Digest version of life. Doris Day sang "Que Sera Sera" and she echoed the sentiment. She knew about the early Beatles, the group that was a hit in Europe, before they came to America and "got crazy". She'd sing the closest thing to a lullabye to her baby, "Listen, Do-Wah-Do, Do you Want To Know A Secret?" and pour out all her grief and sorrow to her little girl. Teaching her a few "face" words in Portuguese, Lingua, Nariz, Olhos, Boca, Cara. The secret was she wanted to be back in Portugal.
Her father's favorite singer was Judy Collins. But that was all hearsay. "He had died when she was young" (a phrase she heard herself saying so often that she thought she should put it to music). He left behind no records of his own.
She didn't get a stereo of her own until after he died. It was a radio, PLUS a record player, PLUS a tape deck to record off of the previous two. She dated her musical life from the point she could tape her favorite songs off the radio and borrow records from the library. That and her walkman meant she could listen to her tape of Judy Collins asking them to send in the clowns a million times without ever understanding what it was about. But logging it in her memory banks for later translation.
There were commercials on television about these songs she heard on Oldies 103, during the Burns and Allen Show, during the Danny Thomas Show, during Leave it to Beaver and I Dream of Jeannie. Hits of the 50's, Solid Gold of the 60's, spliced into new songs-so you couldn't tell which notes belonged to which songs. The ultimate mix-tape.
And then there was a commercial about The Carpenters. From the way the announcer talked about them, you could tell there was tragedy. Were they a couple? Was it a murder-suicide? Did he die young like her father? The songs were so beautiful, and she NEVER heard them on the radio-were they banned? (Was the tragedy as bad as Charles Manson?) Or just forgotten? She snuck a check from her mother's secret hiding place and sent $19.95 plus shipping and handling for a two record or cassette set, featuring the Carpenters. She chose cassettes because they were easier to hide.
She brought them on the road trip to Quabbin Reservoir, she brought them to San Jose. She listened to them instead of listening to the grown-ups talk. She was a teenager anyway, a decade or two off.
When she found out the true story, that she had been listening to the Patron Saint of Anorexics, she got into the habit of not eating whenever their songs came on. It fit right in with her own lifestyle. She could go for 4 days without eating, and even then, she had stopped because of a mental block, not because she was hungry.
Somehow, the radio began playing Carpenter songs whenever they were in a diner.
"Aren't you gonna eat? You just said you were starving!"
"Um, no. I'm not hungry anymore," staring at the luscious hamburger on her plate.
"Is she finished?" asked the waitress.
"I guess. Don't you want to wrap it up?"
Karen wouldn't want you to. SHE wouldn't eat a hamburger.
"Um, no thank you. I'm done,"
The combination of Catholic School teaching the virtues of suffering and the holy voice of Karen would confuse her for decades.
She never starved herself down to her ideal weight, even when she stopped eating. So she figured she might as well treat food like other people did. But she'd stop everytime she heard Karen's voice coming over the loudspeakers. Karen would want you to enjoy everything this life had to offer.
Nothing tastes as good as thin.
Thin tastes like death.
Food=Life=Sensual Pleasures=Music=Sex=Life (Good and Bad)
She was learning from a ghost to remember the old music fondly. A memory once removed. Remembering herself, remembering Karen remembering the Do-Wop from the 50's.
"Those old memories/ still sound so good to me . . . "
"Aren't you gonna eat your hamburger?"
"I think I'll save it for later,"
The Carpenters, featuring Karen Carpenter, Yesterday Once More
Nowadays ____ Can't Even Sing
DJ DAYS-DRIVING TO AN APPEARANCE
"Who's coming home on the old ninety five?" Does that mean the highway?? Boston/New York?
I don't know. Yeah, maybe.
I really love this band.
This one? Glad you do. Ever hear of a band called "Buffalo Fish"?
No, HA! Was it a cover band for this one? A parody band?
A parody band? Um, no, it was a proto-version. It was this lead singer and a few other guys. And me.
YOU!?!?! What do you mean?
I mean, I knew these guys. We all came from New York to LA together. He recommended me for an audition. They wanted someone who looked twice as good, but could sing half as well.
Audition? You mean, The Audition?
Yep. And when I got it, when I was the one making all the money. God, $100K in a single year! That was Hollywood money, baby! In those days. I loaned him money to buy a sailboat. I believed in him when nobody else did.
And now? Have you ever tried to get your money back?
What? Now that he's been knighted by the Rock gods and I've been forgotten?
No, I mean, well, he could do a show with you or something . . .
YOU negotiate that one with his agent!!
Okay, I will! Have you even asked?
Never mind. DON'T.
(They were silent for a few miles. She didn't want to bring out that alcoholic-pity tone in his voice. The bitter, sour notes that came into his conversation, like that awful "Auntie" song he had to sing during concerts with the group. Fitting into his old minstrel show of himself, lines well-rehearsed. Mr.Bojangles, dance. He got that look sometimes when he flipped through record bins. All of them young and happy. His friends in the "Classic Rock" bins, and his best work in the "Novelty" section.)
He was driving. And dry-eyed.
You know, I work very hard to keep myself in the mindset of being the virtuous folk/blues guy. Playing for anyone who will show up. Keeping the faith that it's a matter of persistance. Or that I used up all the recognition when I was 22. But there are moments, y'know? When this seems like such a sham. I don't understand how our paths diverged. I was the one who took the road more traveled, and that HAS made all the difference. But the thing is . . . if I hadn't signed that pact with the devil, I don't think I would've had a career at all. I think I'd still be washing dishes.
(That hit her hard. Was it possible that all the Stars in Hollywood and Rock were NOT preordained to be famous? Growing up on Entertainment Tonight, it had all seemed like a modern version of the Roman Gods she'd studied in school. Now even those seemed like random hype. Fame was all fiction. It was like discovering that Columbus knew America was there.//Like Alice had taken opium, like Snow White had been raped by a necrophiliac. It was the same feeling. The world shifted slightly on its axis as they pulled into Canobie Lake Park.
She had a month of Sundays in her mind, days when her father was still alive and had taken her there on Company Picnic Days. Her heart stuck in midair as the plastic log reached the summit, before it slid down on the flume. The idea of not being able to stop it, the point of no return. Some of the more simple, delicious days of childhood and early summer. All the rides were free and there were no lines. As if she had the place to herself. And now, here he was, her hero, ready to announce the lineup of other acts. Not even asked to sing.
His guitar case was in the backseat. Like it always was. She couldn't remember the last time he had taken it out. She wasn't even sure if there was a guitar in there.
Buffalo Springfield, Nowadays Clancy Can't Even Sing
"Who's coming home on the old ninety five?" Does that mean the highway?? Boston/New York?
I don't know. Yeah, maybe.
I really love this band.
This one? Glad you do. Ever hear of a band called "Buffalo Fish"?
No, HA! Was it a cover band for this one? A parody band?
A parody band? Um, no, it was a proto-version. It was this lead singer and a few other guys. And me.
YOU!?!?! What do you mean?
I mean, I knew these guys. We all came from New York to LA together. He recommended me for an audition. They wanted someone who looked twice as good, but could sing half as well.
Audition? You mean, The Audition?
Yep. And when I got it, when I was the one making all the money. God, $100K in a single year! That was Hollywood money, baby! In those days. I loaned him money to buy a sailboat. I believed in him when nobody else did.
And now? Have you ever tried to get your money back?
What? Now that he's been knighted by the Rock gods and I've been forgotten?
No, I mean, well, he could do a show with you or something . . .
YOU negotiate that one with his agent!!
Okay, I will! Have you even asked?
Never mind. DON'T.
(They were silent for a few miles. She didn't want to bring out that alcoholic-pity tone in his voice. The bitter, sour notes that came into his conversation, like that awful "Auntie" song he had to sing during concerts with the group. Fitting into his old minstrel show of himself, lines well-rehearsed. Mr.Bojangles, dance. He got that look sometimes when he flipped through record bins. All of them young and happy. His friends in the "Classic Rock" bins, and his best work in the "Novelty" section.)
He was driving. And dry-eyed.
You know, I work very hard to keep myself in the mindset of being the virtuous folk/blues guy. Playing for anyone who will show up. Keeping the faith that it's a matter of persistance. Or that I used up all the recognition when I was 22. But there are moments, y'know? When this seems like such a sham. I don't understand how our paths diverged. I was the one who took the road more traveled, and that HAS made all the difference. But the thing is . . . if I hadn't signed that pact with the devil, I don't think I would've had a career at all. I think I'd still be washing dishes.
(That hit her hard. Was it possible that all the Stars in Hollywood and Rock were NOT preordained to be famous? Growing up on Entertainment Tonight, it had all seemed like a modern version of the Roman Gods she'd studied in school. Now even those seemed like random hype. Fame was all fiction. It was like discovering that Columbus knew America was there.//Like Alice had taken opium, like Snow White had been raped by a necrophiliac. It was the same feeling. The world shifted slightly on its axis as they pulled into Canobie Lake Park.
She had a month of Sundays in her mind, days when her father was still alive and had taken her there on Company Picnic Days. Her heart stuck in midair as the plastic log reached the summit, before it slid down on the flume. The idea of not being able to stop it, the point of no return. Some of the more simple, delicious days of childhood and early summer. All the rides were free and there were no lines. As if she had the place to herself. And now, here he was, her hero, ready to announce the lineup of other acts. Not even asked to sing.
His guitar case was in the backseat. Like it always was. She couldn't remember the last time he had taken it out. She wasn't even sure if there was a guitar in there.
Buffalo Springfield, Nowadays Clancy Can't Even Sing
Friday, January 10, 2014
COFFEE!
"You're Every Thought/
Your Every Think/
You're Every Song I'll Ever Sink"
They had stopped for coffee an hour ago. Iowa rolled out before and behind them; a toy car driving over the patchwork quilt. Somehow, the countryside looked more beautiful over her shoulder and he couldn't stop looking at her in the passenger seat. She was serene as a movie star. The bright sun and the cold air. He loved these moments when the world was made up of only her and the road and the air and the sunlight. Coffee and primary colors for breakfast. Sunny side up eggs, ketchup. He could do without the sausage & bacon oil and bread, but he loved the change in the air. And the smell of snow.
She turned to him and laughed.
"It's happened again!"
"What? What's so funny?"
"It's the coffee. It's acting on me again!"
"What's it doing to you?"
They had this conversation before. He was asking because he wanted her to say it.
"Horny. It's making me horny."
They both laughed.
"Now? It's the most inconvenient time!! Look, we were late getting started. And I think we're gonna hit traffic later on. But if I must, I must."
He drew his hands over the steering wheel as if he were going to pull the car over to change a flat.
She was laughing and protesting. This was almost an old game to them.
He wanted an exact description of what she was going through. Partially scientific, partially arousing, partially just human curiosity for the experience of the opposite sex. And mostly, it was the honesty that she shared with him.
Other lovers tried brazen honesty, and they tried with others, but there was always something of the "performer" in the experience.
Somehow that was the best, how they could both strip down so quickly and so easily about Sex. Even when they left their clothes on.
Your Every Think/
You're Every Song I'll Ever Sink"
They had stopped for coffee an hour ago. Iowa rolled out before and behind them; a toy car driving over the patchwork quilt. Somehow, the countryside looked more beautiful over her shoulder and he couldn't stop looking at her in the passenger seat. She was serene as a movie star. The bright sun and the cold air. He loved these moments when the world was made up of only her and the road and the air and the sunlight. Coffee and primary colors for breakfast. Sunny side up eggs, ketchup. He could do without the sausage & bacon oil and bread, but he loved the change in the air. And the smell of snow.
She turned to him and laughed.
"It's happened again!"
"What? What's so funny?"
"It's the coffee. It's acting on me again!"
"What's it doing to you?"
They had this conversation before. He was asking because he wanted her to say it.
"Horny. It's making me horny."
They both laughed.
"Now? It's the most inconvenient time!! Look, we were late getting started. And I think we're gonna hit traffic later on. But if I must, I must."
He drew his hands over the steering wheel as if he were going to pull the car over to change a flat.
She was laughing and protesting. This was almost an old game to them.
He wanted an exact description of what she was going through. Partially scientific, partially arousing, partially just human curiosity for the experience of the opposite sex. And mostly, it was the honesty that she shared with him.
Other lovers tried brazen honesty, and they tried with others, but there was always something of the "performer" in the experience.
Somehow that was the best, how they could both strip down so quickly and so easily about Sex. Even when they left their clothes on.
Friday, January 3, 2014
Loving you is not a choice/And not much reason to rejoice
She tried very hard to get him to like HER music. The Great American Songbook. Broadway musicals, etc. He was very sensitive to songs they gay guys sing. Some songs he knew from his mother, or were just in the ether (how did he KNOW “By the Sea” and “I’m Just Wild About Harry”?)
She got him on SONDHEIM.
At first he missed the subtle clevernesses. They were interesting, story songs. Fillagreed with puns and clever constructions, and the music line wasn’t bad either. He could see why she liked them.
At first, he wasn’t touched by them. But he LOVEd to hear HER talk about them.
She'd get teary-eyed trying to talk about a song, which ruined her singing voice for the rest of the day.
But by then she wasn't singing everyday anymore.
He was doing the Svengali thing, not even sure she'd get the reference. Teaching her, or TRYING to teach her about music. "Up a tone, up a tone, up a tone!!" She was just plain stupid about some things.
Just when he was ready to have her run from the room screaming. Apparently only Sondheim could make her cry.
Stephen Sondheim, Passion
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