Last Leaf

We were up late at a bar playing music.  We were the "head-liners" which means we played last.  A long night.  We did a good job, the band is really feeling it now, and we are making a joyful, rocking noise.  It was very gratifying.


Up early anyway, and feeling pretty burnt, and still stuck in the midst of my Keith Richard's kick.  Here's Keith in a duet with Tom Waits. "Last Leaf" is from Wait's latest "Bad As Me"... it's my song for the morning after...

The Harder...

Here's a nice little rarity... Keith Richards doing Jimmy Cliff's "The Harder They Come." Sublime...

 

Deus Ex Machina

Yeah, so maybe we are stuck in a bad sitcom and the writers have run out of ideas, and they are just concocting crazy ass situations to try to keep the thing lurching forward.  And it's gets weirder and weirder.  And as the hapless characters in this looney contraption, we pretend that everything is OK. We are barely holding on, we are holding on by a wisp of a thread, and we are in deep denial.  And we are hoping for the Deus Ex Machina to make an appearance... but we're not sure if the writers are up on their Latin.

Jump the Shark

Can a society, a political system, a country, a culture "jump the shark?"  If so, I think we are deep into the "shark jumping" phase!

The Stupid Unravels Slowly!

Ok, I get it, history, meaning in this case, human history, is just a very long, very slow, unraveling of an infinite fount of stupidity.  Human history is the story of our brains.  What we put in them, what we conceive with them and what we believe when we use them.  And most of what we put in, conceive and believe is really, really stupid.


And the stupidity is so enveloping that we even mistake stupidity for intelligence.  But there is an unraveling.  And the best of us; the scientists, the physicists, the cosmologists, are on the case.  They aren't afraid to admit their own stupidities in the face of an observed universe.


Not being afraid to admit your stupidity is the first step to some kind of recovery.  So the unraveling of idiocy moves forward.  But we are only in the early stages of this journey.  And we will not see the end, it's way too far in the distance. So we live in the large, overwhelming sea of the stupid.  We swim in it, we revel in it. Once in awhile we get a glimpse of a glimmer of an intelligent life for ourselves.


It's out there, and we can begin to adopt it as a part of our existence too.  But this wave of humans will not live long enough to see the fruits of the unfolding to intelligence.  We were born way too early in the process. It will take many more waves of humans to get there.  And we may not make it.  It's a long story of the stupid.

First-Rate!

"The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function." - F. Scott Fitzgerald


So on the one hand you think: we're doomed!  On the other hand you think: things will get better!


The big picture sucks.  Everything for me is just peachy keen...


Nothing lasts... love is forever...


I might drop dead at any moment... Maybe I will be the one who lives forever... (or at least long enough to realize all my hopes and dreams)!


Maybe... Maybe not...

Sign Me Up!

What if there is no free will?  And we live in a finite universe where basically everything is pre-determined? Are then things like guilt and regret, useless and pointless and meaningless?  If so, sign me up!

You Go!

You can go with a smile on your mug.  Or you can go kicking and screaming.  You may be happy, or you may be sad.  In the bigger picture, (there's always a bigger picture) it probably just doesn't matter.  You are going to go... so go...

Car Radio, Summer of 1969

I was a little kid.  We lived in an apartment complex.  There was a pool.  It was summer of 1969.  I was outside all the time.  There was a parking lot next to the pool.  One of our neighbors had a car up on blocks.  It was always on blocks,  maybe it's still up on blocks?


Our neighbor was a "Grease Monkey."  He was always working on that car; under the hood, under the car.  He was always streaked with grease and oil.  That was part of his uniform.  The car had a very good radio.  And the radio was always on, maximum volume.  And it was tuned to a Top Forty station.  All the hits, all the time.


And the number one song, that summer, the song that kicked me upside the head, and made me listen was the Rolling Stones' "Honky Tonk Women."  It opened with a cowbell, and a really dirty guitar sound, and the drums were big and funky and upfront, and then the first line... "I met a gin-soaked, barroom queen in Memphis..."  It was all such an eye and ear opener for a little confused Catholic Boy...


My little mind reeled at some of the other lines too... "I laid a Divorcee in New York City..." and "She blew my nose, then she blew my mind..."  and "The Lady, she covered me in Roses..."  Something was going on... I just didn't quite know what... and the band kicked ass, it rocked, it was the essence of rock and roll, it was the essence of cool...

 

Boiling Mystery, Raging Enigma

So it turns out Terra firma, isn't so firm after all.  We don't really know what the hell is going on below our feet.  We are walking around on the crust of the planet, but the center, the core, is a hellacious, boiling mystery, a raging enigma.


Makes you wonder what's really going on.  Is there a secret agenda?  We have no clue about the things we take for granted, and the things we don't take for granted either.


We also seem incredibly lucky to be walking around on this ball of confusion.  There is a mind-boggling universe of factors that make it all possible.  And well, most of what we do while we are here seems pretty damn lame.  WTF.


Still, we're here, as unlikely as that might seem, and we should try to do the best we can, while we can. Mother Earth is a sweet lady, and a raging, boiling, radioactive Hell-Cat too...

Unselfish Keef!

I blogged about Keef's other band a couple of posts ago.  I've been immersing myself in the X-pensive Winos live album recorded at the Hollywood Palladium.  It really is a great record, a revelation.  If you are a Keith Richards fan it's essential.


It stands up better than the Keith solo album Talk is Cheap.  That record is good (I own the original vinyl copy), and it provides the bulk of the songs in the live set, but the overall sound of the studio version seems dated. It's very 1980's. 


I think the prime culprit is the sound of the drums.  Was it the recording technology of the day?  Or was it just the sonic fashion of those cocaine years?  There's a falseness, a hollowness, an antiseptic quality to the drum sound that just does not sit well.


Anyway, the band sounds better live.  They really groove, they swing, and there's no studio sheen to contend with.  Keith is an amazing ensemble player.  And a great rhythm player.  Keith is known as a rascal, a pirate, an outlaw, but he's also a gracious, unselfish musician.  Here they do a cover of a reggae song. They nail it... 

I Follow an Inner Light

The 2nd track from our CD 10+1 is now on Sound Cloud. This song catches our band in fine r&r form. I guess you could say this song is my personal motto.  Very pleased with how it all came together.  Love the Beatlesy backwards thing in the beginning.  And my white John Suhr Classic sounds pretty good in the instrumental break.


By the way, if you are interested in buying a copy of our limited-edition, limited-release CD, check out all the avenues for purchase on our whitewolfsonicprincess website.

Lichtenstein Universe

A day off from any responsibilities.  Rare.  We went to the Art Institute of Chicago to see the Roy Lichtenstein Retrospective...


The Lichtenstein Universe is quite appealing; it's all surface, form, line, dot, splashy color, comic, light, edgy, funny, pop.  There is no darkness, no pathos, no drama (maybe comic melodrama!).  A breath of fresh air for sure.


Pop at it's frothy best.  So inspiring to see a good slice of a man's work, and all the work is dedicated to a vision of lightness.  And the low is elevated to the high. You smile, you laugh, you admire the light touch, the steady hand, the zen-like approach to art.


You are transformed in the process... that's the beauty of art.  And even drowning and death, well, we admire the color and form, and the overly-melodramatic situation.  Those tears don't cut... they are flat, another formal element.  Yeah, and Fuck Brad...

Redemption

I was learning songs for our guitar circle. This one from Bob Marley is one of the greats... redemption... it's for all of us... 

Keef's Other Band

I've been spinning the X-pensive Winos live album (concert 1988, CD released 1991) obsessively (my obsessions do not respect space or time!) over the last few days.  Certainly a band in superb form.  And no backstage hatred.  Maybe Keef made lots more money in that other more famous band he's in, but the long simmering feud he's had with their big-lipped, lead singer has pretty much doomed their collaboration over the last 25 years or so.


Mutual contempt does not make for great collaboration.


The X-pensive Winos is Keith's dream band for sure.  Sympathetic players all around. Keith's voice is cracked and worn, but it's just great for these songs. And the song-writing duo of Keith Richards and Steve Jordan was very, very fruitful... love, love, love this song... beautiful... and the whole disc is just brilliant!  Great guitar playing and the band is powerful and soulful.  Swings too!

Lost!

Lost.  Feeling lost.  It's not a foreign feeling.  Lots of my time on the planet has been an adventure of the lost and found.  No use fighting it.  It's a feeling that you can trust and run away with.


Some people (like Chet Baker) would counsel: Let's Get Lost!  Sometimes you seek lost-ness, and sometimes it just descends upon you like a little dark cloud of madness.

Impossible Course

OK, yes, we are embarked upon an impossible course.  That's just the way it played out.  Character and circumstance.  And the road is filled with impossibilities.  They are numerous and glimmering.


They can hypnotize you and lead you on.  And you are led even as you lead.  You are making the wave and riding it too.

Faking It!

According to this little article, it might be healthier to be optimistic.  And if you can't be optimistic, you can fake it.  And faking it might be just good enough...

IF

"If you want to die, do that.  But if you want to live, get on with it." - John Lennon

A Good One!

Yeah, that's a good one...


Am I living life?


Or is life living me?