The Heart is, Uh, Lemme see...a Lonely, Uh...
Sorry if I hadn’t told you till now...
You know what they say about cobbler's children, bad shoes, etc? Well, I’ve had only a week to get used to this myself - but thanks to a severe bout of sleep apnea, which led me to take my pulse, which lead to a trip to my doctor to an overnight EKG monitor to my doctor calling me last Wednesday saying "Where are you?" and ordering me to get to an emergency room - I begged for 2 hours so I could email students and take a shower - and now I sport a pacemaker.
When your doctor calls you and asks where you are rather than how you feel that day, you turn the car around and go.
It’s not like there’s any cloggy heart disease or atrial cell death from drug abuse or anything like that. All that stuff actually looks good. It’s just that my distributor cap (sinus node - sounds like my nose is in my chest) just ain’t conducting current like it did.
I’m maturing.
Reality is, the ticker has less ticks left than it has done already. There’s a date stamped on my butt that only the Great Maker can read (I sound just like your devout Uncle Frank, don’t I?). That’s ok. I know stuff now. As an older tennis player friend of mine used to say, “old age, experience, and treachery will trump youth and exuberance every time.” I can go back to running as soon as the weather gets below like 80 deg. Partially for the new leads attached to my ventricle to keep them from poking holes in my heart with an all too enthusiastic beating. Mostly because the dogs don’t have the stamina that I have.
Come the apocalypse I'm not looking for canned goods. I'm hunting down batteries. I'll kill a brother or at least trade some sardines for a couple fresh AAA's. Man, I’d look just wrong, wrong, wrong on those shows like The Walking Dead or Revolution or something. All these survivalists wondering around with crossbows and such and then there’s me, a walking talking Radio Shack. Beatin' up little kids to take the batteries out of their Nintendos, tripping old ladies with their flash cameras.
I feel less affinity with Katniss from Hunger Games and more with Ironman. Minus the flying of course. Does jogging count? But yeah, big old electronic thing in my chest. Mine doesn't have the blue Nite-Lite ET Phone Home feature Robert Downey's has.
I'll tell you, the scar for this thing itches more than it hurts, but yeah, it hurts. I can't imagine how shid like this must feel like for folks that have been shot or stabbed, as that shid is random, while this cut thru my chest muscle fascia was well decided and planned forehand.
Fear not. I did a gig 24 hours after my release, a private party underneath a loud, rained-on tent, and I was still a hit. Ahhh, stereotypes die hard. Right back out into the field after giving birth, me and my people.
It’ll be business as usual: Falcon Ridge, Owen Sound Ontario, my model airplane national competition, no wildly excessive new view on my life or life-changing repentance as to what I didn’t do, I’ll start working on my new album. Doesn’t hurt that my cardiologist is an aviation enthusiast, and seems to generally be a nice guy, white pants, pink tie and all. Old Navy flight surgeon, wry humored, quick and funny as hell, saluting and stuff. Kinda like he was booted from the set of M*A*S*H.
I’m a badass with a grey beard, that’s all. I’d better be. It’s all I got.
New Album
Here’s the potential song list. Some of these tunes I don’t even really know well enough yet. In no particular order:
Out The Way We Came In
God Bless Everyone
December 3rd
First Ring
Garden In Winter
Sweet Potato Dove
Evelyne
Kiss the Bad Boys
Holiday Employment
Nothing From You
...And a bonus tune that cries out to be re-recorded; can’t say as of yet.
I’ll be fishing for a title, and really, any of these songs' titles would work. I do however love how Richard Thompson will name albums with names that have nothing to do with any song on the album. Titles like Sweet Warrior, Electric, Mock Tudor, Rumor & Sigh, reflect not a single song on any of his albums.
So for me? I don’t know:
Lipstick For Pelicans
Chocolate Buick
Tangerine Trampoline
Rent My Breath
Turtle, Turtle
Inflatable Poodle
Don’t even ask what’s on the cover...
French Open Tennis
I was so excited. But the grunting got old.
Yeah, some men do a bit, but the women shriek. I respect Venus Williams’ effort in getting equal prize money and such, but what a disservice to the sport’s professionalism and her efforts with all the shrieking. And if people are tuning in to hear that in particular, then we should all be ashamed.
Weird, but I’d rather watch baseball players scratch and spit than listen to the shrieking of women’s tennis. Eww, maybe both actually suck.
Yeah, I’m going with that.
The New Album Part Deux
I’ve thought about a fundraising campaign of some sort to finance the compilation, production, and promotion of this next album. Kickstarter or something of that ilk, maybe, credit cards, donations, barter, bank loans, combinations of all of the above. Just mentioning it brought out a few folks just offering me money, which I thought to be kind as all get out. Thanks Furry - you know who you are - you’re a kind fellow. Your quiet enthusiasm for what I do is infectious to me.
The next album will have band stuff, I’m sure. Some of these tunes just cry out for band treatment, so the folks who’d like my music to stay eternally acoustic, solo, and quiet like I was playing at the foot of their bed will pout. Those that listen to and potentially get the concept musicians have in mind when we do add instrumentation on various tunes will be handsomely rewarded for their less narrow listening palate.
That division is palpable and always perplexing to me. No one I know asks U2 or even Allison Krauss to come out with an album sans supporting musicians. But I have folks come to me with alarming frequency looking for “less instrumentally encumbered” releases.
“I don’t like drums. You have an album like that?”
“Which one sounds most like what you did tonight?”
“Hey Mr. Stravinsky, you have a version of that ‘Spring Thing’ with like just pennywhistle and accordion?”
Why make or force us acoustic musicians to be the cornerstones of some musically and sonically simplistic place for listeners to land? Must we eternally be relegated to the All-Kumbaya-All-The-Time channel? Do folks come to these shows and buy these albums because they want a mellow, boxed-wine after work feel for an evening, or are they listening to content, presentation, and concept?
Now granted, there’s are plenty of acoustic albums out there that are so “overproduced” with other than the core instrument stuff that it seems all story, intent, everything else gets lost. Maybe more of us acoustic performers are guilty of that than we could know. And how dare I even bring Stravinsky or the like into this conversation? Well, let it be said, I don’t believe the Rite Of Spring to be any more elegant, important, or musically iconic than my friend Pete Seeger’s "Where Have All The Flowers Gone"? And if Pete suggests that a version with tuba, 8 cello, and glass harmonica was something to listen to, well I’m all ears.
That all said, this batch of tunes is quite incredible, some even “hit” material, and they deserve to be showcased in a way that their bestness is far forward. I’ll probably need $18 - 20,000 to do this right like I want to.
If you have any album funding ideas contact me.
Direct Post-Op From The Hospital
Here’s a text note sent to various loved ones at some point in the middle of the night after my surgery, commenting on the frequency of nurses, doctors and the like:
Jesus Mary and Joseph what a parade! "Hello I am the assistant to the adjutant that sews the straps on the right had side of the johnnie...I have been sent in to make damn sure you don't sleep.."
You know what they say about cobbler's children, bad shoes, etc? Well, I’ve had only a week to get used to this myself - but thanks to a severe bout of sleep apnea, which led me to take my pulse, which lead to a trip to my doctor to an overnight EKG monitor to my doctor calling me last Wednesday saying "Where are you?" and ordering me to get to an emergency room - I begged for 2 hours so I could email students and take a shower - and now I sport a pacemaker.
When your doctor calls you and asks where you are rather than how you feel that day, you turn the car around and go.
It’s not like there’s any cloggy heart disease or atrial cell death from drug abuse or anything like that. All that stuff actually looks good. It’s just that my distributor cap (sinus node - sounds like my nose is in my chest) just ain’t conducting current like it did.
I’m maturing.
Reality is, the ticker has less ticks left than it has done already. There’s a date stamped on my butt that only the Great Maker can read (I sound just like your devout Uncle Frank, don’t I?). That’s ok. I know stuff now. As an older tennis player friend of mine used to say, “old age, experience, and treachery will trump youth and exuberance every time.” I can go back to running as soon as the weather gets below like 80 deg. Partially for the new leads attached to my ventricle to keep them from poking holes in my heart with an all too enthusiastic beating. Mostly because the dogs don’t have the stamina that I have.
Come the apocalypse I'm not looking for canned goods. I'm hunting down batteries. I'll kill a brother or at least trade some sardines for a couple fresh AAA's. Man, I’d look just wrong, wrong, wrong on those shows like The Walking Dead or Revolution or something. All these survivalists wondering around with crossbows and such and then there’s me, a walking talking Radio Shack. Beatin' up little kids to take the batteries out of their Nintendos, tripping old ladies with their flash cameras.
I feel less affinity with Katniss from Hunger Games and more with Ironman. Minus the flying of course. Does jogging count? But yeah, big old electronic thing in my chest. Mine doesn't have the blue Nite-Lite ET Phone Home feature Robert Downey's has.
I'll tell you, the scar for this thing itches more than it hurts, but yeah, it hurts. I can't imagine how shid like this must feel like for folks that have been shot or stabbed, as that shid is random, while this cut thru my chest muscle fascia was well decided and planned forehand.
Fear not. I did a gig 24 hours after my release, a private party underneath a loud, rained-on tent, and I was still a hit. Ahhh, stereotypes die hard. Right back out into the field after giving birth, me and my people.
It’ll be business as usual: Falcon Ridge, Owen Sound Ontario, my model airplane national competition, no wildly excessive new view on my life or life-changing repentance as to what I didn’t do, I’ll start working on my new album. Doesn’t hurt that my cardiologist is an aviation enthusiast, and seems to generally be a nice guy, white pants, pink tie and all. Old Navy flight surgeon, wry humored, quick and funny as hell, saluting and stuff. Kinda like he was booted from the set of M*A*S*H.
I’m a badass with a grey beard, that’s all. I’d better be. It’s all I got.
New Album
Here’s the potential song list. Some of these tunes I don’t even really know well enough yet. In no particular order:
Out The Way We Came In
God Bless Everyone
December 3rd
First Ring
Garden In Winter
Sweet Potato Dove
Evelyne
Kiss the Bad Boys
Holiday Employment
Nothing From You
...And a bonus tune that cries out to be re-recorded; can’t say as of yet.
I’ll be fishing for a title, and really, any of these songs' titles would work. I do however love how Richard Thompson will name albums with names that have nothing to do with any song on the album. Titles like Sweet Warrior, Electric, Mock Tudor, Rumor & Sigh, reflect not a single song on any of his albums.
So for me? I don’t know:
Lipstick For Pelicans
Chocolate Buick
Tangerine Trampoline
Rent My Breath
Turtle, Turtle
Inflatable Poodle
Don’t even ask what’s on the cover...
French Open Tennis
I was so excited. But the grunting got old.
Yeah, some men do a bit, but the women shriek. I respect Venus Williams’ effort in getting equal prize money and such, but what a disservice to the sport’s professionalism and her efforts with all the shrieking. And if people are tuning in to hear that in particular, then we should all be ashamed.
Weird, but I’d rather watch baseball players scratch and spit than listen to the shrieking of women’s tennis. Eww, maybe both actually suck.
Yeah, I’m going with that.
The New Album Part Deux
I’ve thought about a fundraising campaign of some sort to finance the compilation, production, and promotion of this next album. Kickstarter or something of that ilk, maybe, credit cards, donations, barter, bank loans, combinations of all of the above. Just mentioning it brought out a few folks just offering me money, which I thought to be kind as all get out. Thanks Furry - you know who you are - you’re a kind fellow. Your quiet enthusiasm for what I do is infectious to me.
The next album will have band stuff, I’m sure. Some of these tunes just cry out for band treatment, so the folks who’d like my music to stay eternally acoustic, solo, and quiet like I was playing at the foot of their bed will pout. Those that listen to and potentially get the concept musicians have in mind when we do add instrumentation on various tunes will be handsomely rewarded for their less narrow listening palate.
That division is palpable and always perplexing to me. No one I know asks U2 or even Allison Krauss to come out with an album sans supporting musicians. But I have folks come to me with alarming frequency looking for “less instrumentally encumbered” releases.
“I don’t like drums. You have an album like that?”
“Which one sounds most like what you did tonight?”
“Hey Mr. Stravinsky, you have a version of that ‘Spring Thing’ with like just pennywhistle and accordion?”
Why make or force us acoustic musicians to be the cornerstones of some musically and sonically simplistic place for listeners to land? Must we eternally be relegated to the All-Kumbaya-All-The-Time channel? Do folks come to these shows and buy these albums because they want a mellow, boxed-wine after work feel for an evening, or are they listening to content, presentation, and concept?
Now granted, there’s are plenty of acoustic albums out there that are so “overproduced” with other than the core instrument stuff that it seems all story, intent, everything else gets lost. Maybe more of us acoustic performers are guilty of that than we could know. And how dare I even bring Stravinsky or the like into this conversation? Well, let it be said, I don’t believe the Rite Of Spring to be any more elegant, important, or musically iconic than my friend Pete Seeger’s "Where Have All The Flowers Gone"? And if Pete suggests that a version with tuba, 8 cello, and glass harmonica was something to listen to, well I’m all ears.
That all said, this batch of tunes is quite incredible, some even “hit” material, and they deserve to be showcased in a way that their bestness is far forward. I’ll probably need $18 - 20,000 to do this right like I want to.
If you have any album funding ideas contact me.
Direct Post-Op From The Hospital
Here’s a text note sent to various loved ones at some point in the middle of the night after my surgery, commenting on the frequency of nurses, doctors and the like:
Jesus Mary and Joseph what a parade! "Hello I am the assistant to the adjutant that sews the straps on the right had side of the johnnie...I have been sent in to make damn sure you don't sleep.."
