The Ballad of Stayed and Gone 5

Here are two new sketches on the continuing Ballad.

Walk*
This bit represents my coming to terms with the most basic influence for what I hope this record will be.

Dialogue is invaluable to me during the creative process. I don’t create well in a vacuum so I need the back and forth and exchange of ideas I’ve generally found in bands, friends, music venues, etc. However over the last year that dialogue has been somewhat lacking. Since the arrival of our daughter the band hasn’t been gigging. The Ms and I have played a few shows in the past month and we are slowly making our way back to the clubs, but it’s been slow moving. Since we haven’t been gigging we also haven’t been having official band practices. The Ms and I practice at home when we can, but she is busy with her new business and with the baby, so the little time we get alone together we haven’t been using for practicing music. We also haven’t been in bars and friends houses playing and exchanging ideas until the sun comes up. Of course, none of this is said as a complaint. It is our new life with our daughter, and I love it. But it’s a transition period, and it needs a little tuning. And one of the aspects that needs tuning is that I’m having to find new ways to interact with people and get that dialogue that I use as part of my creative output.

I am working on various ways to obtain such dialogue, and one of them is this blog. Granted it is not the same as all of us sitting around in a practice room with our instruments working on music, but by the same token it may offer other possibilities. That being said, I appreciate the comments that have been offered, but at the same time I wish for more. I wish you would all see this blog as the great opportunity that it could be. We each have our own preferred modes of expression and we don’t necessarily agree on aesthetics, methodology, or much else for that matter, but we’ve all made a commitment to this blog and to me that combination is one of the best foundations to create something that could actually evolve into something greater than the sum of our parts which ultimately would be a very musical thing to do.

Back to the sketch. In this first sketch you might recognize the beginning of a previous sketch (the wrecking ball). It starts the same, but please, if you’ve heard it stick with it through that beginning because it’s going somewhere totally different this time. However, just as I felt before, I still feel that this is how the record starts. Though I feel the mood is now more acurately described.

Sometimes Mariana*
This is an older song. We have live recordings of it but have never done any kind of studio recording of it. Subject-wise it’s the central inspiration for this record I’m working on. And in a way it’s her record. Mariana’s record, that is. I grew up with Mariana from very little until her dad was stabbed on the street, walked into a bar and bled to death when everyone thought he was just drunk. Then her mom and her and her little sister moved to Canada and I never saw them again. She was my first best friend.

Anyways, the usual version of this song that we play as a band is quite fast (runs about 2 minutes) and in D major. For the record and since I’m thinking about it in terms of being the song right after Walk (see above), I feel it should be slower, more folksy, and in C major (though I’m already beginning to see how it would work with the faster version too). Here’s a first sketch of it with just me on the guitar.

The Ballad of Stayed and Gone 4

In a recent post DD was talking about the difficulties he was having finding a vision before starting to work on his movie. I often wish things were that simple for me – get a vision, bring it forth. For me it’s a substantially more tortuous process. I get a lot of ideas. Mostly stupid ideas, ideas like a song where every other word is the word ‘little’. Sometimes these ideas start to show me that they are connected in some way, and a certain part of myself begins to be exposed by them. Like the idea that I have never really had a home since I left home and therefore what I call home is something else. These connected ideas then begin to show up almost everywhere and I start thinking, ok, maybe this is worth exploring, might as well since they wont’ leave me alone anyways. Let’s see what the hell these ideas are trying to tell me. And I start to think that maybe these ideas are worth sharing and I start to work on how to get them out as something shareable. And I get distracted and start thinking of different ways in which they could be presented, so I pick the easiest one, cause really at this point I want to be done already, I’ve seen the connections in my head. But I’m really just beginning cause nothing has been made yet. And from experience I know that as soon as I start to put the ideas down, they’ll change, suggest something else and the whole thing becomes a whirlwind of trying to stop time and failing, and trying again and failing again. Until at some point I inevitably start wondering, what is the point of all this? Why bother? Why not just go lay by the pool and drink rum til the lights go out? I mean, does anyone really need to hear more music? Do I really need to play guitar ever again, beyond just picking it up and plinking at it while watching TV? Isn’t that enough? Why do I feel the need to put the playing down on record? Why do I feel the need to share it with others? Do I hope that when I die there is something beyond a bunch of well organized offices to say I was here? Maybe. But now I have a child, what better legacy than that? Nothing I could ever record could compare to that. Is it previous commitments that I’ve made to music? Previous sacrifices that are clamoring to please play, please don’t let the sacrifices be in vain? Maybe, but really come on, what sacrifices, really. When I poke my own eyes out Oedipus style so the world stops bothering me with vision, well, then I’ll come back and talk of sacrifices. So far it’s been mostly fun. And is it the fun that seems superfluous? Aren’t there more important things to do than have fun? In this time, as the great American Empire sinks like so many Titanics, isn’t dancing the thing to do? Enjoy that sinking feeling of everything we’ve known as reality giving way under our feet? Yes, that’s a good time for dancing, for playing music, celebrating. The end of the world as we know it. But whatever, that’s been said a million times by everyone. So why bother? Let all those everyones dance and play their way to the bottom, they have more skill, time and money to do it, so why should I? And this is the time in the middle of the creative process where I just want to dump it all and say fuck it. Who needs this? But I’ve done this before, this is one of the many crossroads where I just have to close my eyes and sign the devil’s contract on the dotted line. Again. And again. Fuck it. If it sucks it sucks if it doesn’t it doesn’t ask me if I care? Cause right now I have to care, more than anything. And somehow I must continue to care or I wouldn’t continue to do it, but at the same time I have to not care. And how is that done? How do I care and not care at the same time? I don’t bloody well know. The only way I know to do it is by just sitting in front of the machine, taking its cables and plugging them right into my bloodstream and hoping that this one will feel like something, maybe like the first time, or at least something that I can live with. And sometimes it does, most often it doesn’t. But sometimes it does. And when it does, it never feels like it was that difficult.

So I have to remind myself that the best arrives with ease. Trying too hard is the curse of everything (said the Puerto Rican).

Here's a recent sketch of a song as I plow ahead.
Season of the Grape*

The Ballad of Stayed and Gone 3

I continue to work on sketches and various attempts at music, while at the same time trying to come to terms with how much I like Burt Bacharach and Gerry Rafferty. Cause, what else am I to do?

Double Sunglasses Sunday*
This is an arranged version. Where's my captain's hat?

Double Sunglasses Sunday (solo)*
This is what I think of as an extremely moody/mannered version, kind of getting that extreme out of my system (shudders).

Double Sunglasses Monday*
And this is a variation on the musical theme.