Song A Week 2016 - Look In Yer Heart

I didn't do a song last week and man, the outcry!  Wow.  The reason was that last week's song was destined to be a remix of a Grampa Big Balls recording titled Tip Of A Red Hot Penis that I made some years ago   Remixing?  A breeze. All fine and dandy.  Then I started making the video for the sound piece, comprised of thousands of stills, each displayed anywhere from .11 of a second to .22 of a second.   The collection of images alone has been a time consuming process and when I finally got to making the video, it took me 8 hours to make one minute and forty seconds of video....for a six minute noise piece.

So it has become apparent that that particular piece will be an ongoing work and I figured I'd better get back on the horse.  Before the horse keeled over and drowned in a ditch.  I've been singing this number from the past and decided to give it a whirl......a reboot of an old Dogbreath Brothers song, Look In Yer Heart.

Funny how a song changes through the lens of twenty years.  Here it is.  

And yah, that's Jerome presiding over the recording.

  

Look In Yer Heart

words and music by David P. Smith

Don't go lookin for yourself in a bottle

you'll just crash and burn

you won't find yourself in a reefer

when will you ever learn

You ain't funny when you're wasted

you don't talk too smart

Next time you go lookin for yourself

try lookin in yer heart

I'll throw you down

to the ground

kick you in the back

kick you 'til you hork and hack

and cough up your soul so black

You see yourself in the TV

but it ain't really you

Don't go lookin in some magazine

to tell you what to do

You don't need no gurus

them fellas don't talk so smart

Next time you go lookin for yourself

try lookin in your heart

I'll pick you up by the collar

and give your head a slap

don't give me no backtalk

I'm tired of your crap

You can check out the Dogbreath Brothers version here:     Look In Yer Heart  

Song A week 2016 - New Blues #2 - Funeral Blues - Live with The Ape Shit Army - February 26, 2016

The last two weekends have been spent doing gigs with my current band, The Ape Shit Army.   It's been nourishing and stimulating to practice and play regularly with this group of musicians:  Dan Weisenberger on guitar, Jody Johnson on upright bass, and Rad Juli on drums.  Sometimes entertainment juggernaut Hank Pine joins us for some apocalyptic cello licks, as he does on this recording. We are supplemented vocally at times by Jeanne Tolmie, Ana Bon Bon, and Betty-Ann Lampman.  This shit is fun.

The skeleton of this song was born and documented on Song A Week 2012. I wrote it as an "introductory song" for a songwriting workshop I was attending as a lead up to Arts Wells.  At that time it was New Blues #3....somewhere along the road of rehearsing and recording it became #2 and #3 became #2.  Likely, you don't care about these trivial details.  But dammit that's the meaningless crap I obsess about.  

Since it debuted here as a little baby song in a shitty disposable diaper, it's grown some balls.
This version was recorded live at Solstice Cafe in Victoria, BC,  Friday night on my zoom mic. Tonight I messed around with random video clips I've accumulated on my phone and Frankensteined together a "video" to provide visual stimulus.

 

Funeral Blues

Words and music by David P. Smith

I emote with icons

stumbling down the passage of time

with two thin dimes on my feet

silver dollars in my sockets

draped in a cool white sheet

I could see the storm a-rising

as I rolled on round the bend

I was thinking about the funerals

I've been planning to attend

in my cum-stained pants

my curly hair shirt

in my wagon of woe

dragging a world of hurt

with a sack of blood

a bottle of dirt

Lightning struck the cruise ship

it shattered like a pomegranate

and I clung to two hearts that keep me anchored on this planet

Chorus

Sightless and speechless

a maggot wriggles in the muck

contemplates the vagaries of old Lady Luck

Is a bum hand better

than no hand at all?

It it best to grovel in shit

or to climb up and risk the fall

Sun pierced through the clouds

a heavenly sword of wrath

and I said to the maggot

Yo maggot do the math

Chorus

I could see the storm a-rising

as I rolled on round the bend

I was thinking about my funeral

and who might attend

the haters

the lovers

my sisters

and brothers

Stars rained from the sky

tiny daggers in the night

and I said to myself hey Davey boy

it's fight or flight

it's fight or flight

it's fight or flight

Chorus

Song A Week 2016 - The Drunken Fool - February 22, 2016

Here's a little hillbilly number I wrote some time back that doesn't see the light of day too much.

The Drunken Fool

words and music by David P. Smith

Outside my bedroom window

there's an old old weeping willow

while I sleep he steals my dreams

and spills them on my pillow

When I wake in the morning

with my emptied out old head

it takes me an hour or two

to figure out I ain't dead

Now my heart likes to bellow

from inside his bloody cave

I pay no attention

I know not what he craves

I just get up in the morning

watch clocks go round and round

while I walk around in circles

in this two bit tinkle town

I got no stories to tell

just episodes and incidents

an odd twist of fate an outburst

an empty coincidence

And I got no songs to sing

was never good with dirty jokes

when it comes to witty repartee

I don't have a hope

I'm irritated and quickly bored

by the monkeys and the mules

but if you ply me with your whiskey

I'll play the drunken fool

Song A Week 2016 - My Heart and My Head (Reboot) - February 14, 2016

The song a week blog I did in 2012 provided a catalyst at the time to write some new songs.  I was playing a lot of music with Rachelle Reath, but I didn't have a regular band so to speak and wasn't gigging much.  Maybe that's the reason a bunch of those songs just fell off the radar.  Or maybe they just sucked. Time will tell.  Whatever, this is one of those songs.  

Written in 2012, Rachelle and I recorded it for the blog in 2012 and we performed it maybe two or three times.  I've changed the feel, put it in a different key, and tweaked one of those lyrics.  The particular line I changed had been a thorn in the side.....one of those lines that comes quickly, is an easy rhyme, and is sort of like a punch line.....but ultimately is weak.  Now it's better.

So here it is....Happy Valentine's Day.

My Heart and My Head 

words and music by David P. Smith

My heart pumps blood

through my scrambled veins

My heart is like a machine

machines don't feel pain

My heart

my heart 

my heart

and my head

My head is a vessel of bone

it contains my brain

My brain is like a machine

machines don't feel pain

Machines don't dream

they don't hope or aspire

They just do their jobs

that's how they're wired

My head

my head

my head

and my heart

My heart is not a metaphor

for courage, strength, or love

so please do not speak of these things

you know not what you speak of

My heart is a muscle

a muscle that is strong

It is the pulse it is the engine

to my life and to my song

My heart

my heart 

my heart

oh my heart

My heart

my heart 

my heart

oh my heart

Song A Week 2016 - Picture of Me with Aaron Ellingsen and Jeanne Tolmie

One of the best things about doing this blog is using it as a catalyst to get together with friends and see what happens. Aaron Ellingsen, Jeanne Tolmie and I are frequent collaborators and it was fun and interesting to get together and have a run at this song.

Picture of Me is a song I wrote a few years back that will be released on my upcoming album New Blues.  The studio version is a pretty cool stripped down arrangement - just accordion, Marek Tyler on drums, and my daughter Chloe Lampman singing backups.  This version - which we jammed out and recorded in about an hour or so - has a Cajun folkey feel thanks to Aaron Ellingsen's fiddle arrangement. 

 Picture of Me 

Do you remember that picture of me in a wheat field with that lean brown dog

his hound dog dink was lipstick pink and a red-tail hawk flew over and gave us a wink

And the Alberta sky was as blue as the Aegean Sea

do you remember 

remember that picture of me

And the Alberta sky was as blue as the Aegean Sea

will you remember

will you remember me

And a great long soft white cloud like a feather

stretched across the sky

And it was two hours and twenty-five minutes

before I said good-bye

Do you remember 

do you remember that picture of me

will you remember 

will you remember me

Do you remember 

do you remember that picture of me

will you remember 

will you remember me

Do you remember that picture of me in the bright white light with a galloping horse

my eyes were two black holes

portals to an underworld hotel

where the menacing ceilings hover over cold cold beds

like conquering aliens from the darkness over head

and dirty curtains guard the windows where we sleep

will you remember

will you remember me

And a thick soft swollen grey cloud like the belly of a whale 

filled the sky

And it was twenty-two years twenty two days

two hours and twenty-five minutes

after I said good-bye

Do you remember 

do you remember that picture of me

will you remember 

will you remember me

Do you remember 

do you remember that picture of me

will you remember 

will you remember me

Song A Week 2016 - Seasons (Future Islands Cover) - January 30, 2016

In the fall of 2014 I became obsessed with this song by the band Future Islands and in particular with this version of the song on the David Letterman show.  Not only is the performance riveting, Letterman's reaction is worth the watch

Summer 2015 I just wanted to learn to play it myself.  With some assistance from my musically-smarter-than-me daughter Chloe, I worked up a version on the accordion and quickly became obsessed with playing it. It is a really beautiful pop song.  We're working up a version with my band The Ape Shit Army that we'll be playing at our upcoming shows in February. 

Here is a version of the song I recorded on my phone one night in December. 

 The official video for the song is little bizarre.  Cowboys, rodeos, couples on horses, pickup trucks....I almost suspect it is a deconstructive anti-video.......comments?

Seasons

Seasons change

and I tried hard just to soften you

seasons change

I grew tired of trying to change for you

And I've been waiting on you

I've been waiting on you

I've been waiting on you

I've been waiting on you

When it breaks

the summer will wake

and the winter will wash away the tears

When it breaks

the summer will warm

and the winter will crave what is gone

crave what is all gone away

People change

but some people never do

and when people change

they gain a peace but they lose one too

And I've been waiting on you

I've been waiting on you

 I've been waiting on you

I've been waiting on you

****Stardate Feb 1/2016:  finding lyrics on the Future Islands website today I see that where I sing "...wash away the tears...." the actual lyric is ".....wash away the taste...."   

And here's the gig posters for our upcoming shows in Nanaimo, Powell River, Victoria, and Vancouver.

.

Song A Week 2016 - Why Don't You Do Right - January 24, 2016

Not so long ago after I left home, let's say circa 1980, I went through my parents' records and recorded to cassette anything that seemed remotely interesting.  One song I recorded - from Reader's Digest Million Dollar Memories - was Peggy Lee's version of Why Don't You Do Right with the Benny Goodman Orchestra. Loved that shit.

Fast forward about 30 years, Sarah Rhude and I were talking potential collaborations and Dan Weisenberger is spinning the vinyl at a swinging post-gig loft party.  One slab of vinyl was Lil Green's dynamite original take of the song, a favourite of Sarah's.  Bingo! There's our collaboration.

Well not quite Bingo yet. Fast forward another couple of years to the here and now.  A great benefit of ye olde blog is it acts both as a catalyst and provides purpose to get together with friends and make music. Rhudey and I are chatting about playing some music together, my brain snaps into blog production mode;  Rachelle Reath and I have been talking about playing and have a long history of collaborating - in The Euphorians, as a duo, and numerous occasions the last time I was song-a-week-ing........OK, this time:  Bingo!  For real.  Rhudey, Rachelle, and me.   Here's our version of Why Don't You Do Right, recorded in Rachelle's living room.

Why Don't You Do Right is generally accepted as a reworking of the song Weed Smoker's Dream, recorded in 1936 by The Harlem Hamfats and credited to piano player Joe McCoy.  There is some dispute over that credit as there is over the writing credit of Why Don't You Do Right.  While official credit is given to McCoy for re-working the song into a classic woman's blues number, others see the song as thematically and narratively distinct and believe Lil Green penned her own version. The Lil Green recording of the song was one of Peggy Lee's favourite records.  Here she is.....Lil Green!

In a 1984 interview Peggy Lee said "I was and am a fan of Lil Green, a great old blues singer, and Lil recorded it.  I used to play that record over and over in my dressing room, which was next door to Benny.  Finally he said, ' You obviously like that song.'  I said, 'Oh, I love it.' He said 'Would you like me to have arrangement made of it?' I said 'I'd love that,' and he did."   Here's Peggy Lee live with the Benny Goodman Orchestra.  

And here's a hipper take of it recorded later....Peggy Lee with Dave Barbour and his Band

To write this blog, I referenced Wikipedia and a fascinating article about Peggy Lee written by Ivan Santiago-Mercado.  You can check that article out here The Peggy Lee Bio-Discography And Videography: Observations About The Song "Why Don't You Do Right?"  

And in closing.....Weed Smoker's Dream - Harlem Hamfats