My Heart & My Head - New Song with Rachelle Reath - January 28, 2012

Like a kid who's just built a really cool model or a sweet Lego skyscraper, I'm usually a little stoked after I write a song. I wrote this one earlier this month and was enjoying playing it.....alone.....in my basement. I felt maybe lyrically it was a tad too sadly self-indulgent for public consumption.  For me, the litmus test is how the song feels when I play it to an audience. There are times when a song I felt pretty good about in the afterglow of penning it, just doesn't fly when I play it live for the first time - falls out of my mouth like a hairball, hangs in the air like a bad smell, is just plain awkward.  Well I played this one the other night at the accordion show and it felt good.   More sweetly melancholic than sadly self-indulgent, enough humour to counter-balance the gloom.  The minor/major semi-tone modulations in the melody, like the Tin Pan Alley dudes used to do, are like candy to me.

My friend and collaborator Rachelle Reath popped by this afternoon and I taught her the song.  We worked out an arrangement, did two and a half takes, and laid it down.  One aim of this exercise is to not get precious, let go, just do it, and that's what we did.  

I met Rachelle a couple of years ago when she sang some backup harmonies on a recording I was working on and we have been playing together in one format or another since.  She is a dedicated and gifted musician who brings a lot of joy to the act of making music and by extension, is a joy to play with.   She is also a patient and talented music teacher - if you're in the Victoria/Sydney area looking for a great violin teacher, let me know, and I'll pass along your contact info!

My Heart & My Head

My heart pumps blood

through my scrambled veins

My heart is like a machine

and machines don't feel pain

My heart, my heart, my heart, my heart

and my head

My head is a vessel of bone

it contains my brain

my brain is like machine

and 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, 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

If you write a song about a muscle

will anyone sing along

My heart, my heart, my heart, my heart

oh my heart

My heart, my heart, my heart, my heart

oh my heart

Heather Leaves - Accordion Duet with Grayson Walker - January 22, 2012

One night after an evening in a local drinking establishment, I went to Grayson Walker's house and drunk on the blood of our enemies we ended up feverishly playing accordion together in his kitchen.  It felt pretty good and I thought we should do it again.  As fate would have it, my old and dear friend Ana Bon Bon (an extraordinary chanteuse, entertainer and accordionist who currently resides in swinging London town) contacted to me say she would be back in Canada. Ha! I could see that the stars were aligning, started planning an all accordion show @ The Forbes Street Music Club, and got on the blower to Grayson.  The first time we got together he started teaching me this song which he describes thus....

The song started as a technical study to teach myself accordion so I could go busking in the Montreal metros. During that time my longtime music partner Randy Peters and I became friends with "Heather" a former child star who could sing like an angel.  She was apparently not happy with her life as she committed suicide.  The song then got more elaborate and was named "Heather Leaves.".

This take was from our rehearsal on Friday afternoon.  The mic is kind of hot and  there's a bit of distortion as the accordion playing heats up.  We are also working on Grayson's compostion Western Momma, Clay George's Stefan Ganis, and the standard All of Me.  Playing accordions together is exhilirating - thanks Grayson!  

  

And you may very well ask who is this Grayson Walker you speak of?  Well from some press I have for the upcoming SEETHING ACCORDIONS show, I can tell you this....the accordion has saved Grayson Walker's life many times. Once, while waiting in a Canadian Tire parking lot, he was surrounded by Quebecois bikers. A quick polka later they were dancing and laughing instead of breaking his legs. For a while, he was the accordion player for drone darlings Godspeed You! Black Emperor. He and his accordion also co-founded the Church of Harvey Christ and Friends, a band/ fringe theatre/ drinking gang from which he has been ex- and re-communicated many times as per scripture. His tastes with the squeezebox run from old timey singsongs like "I Don't Love You Anymore" and "It's Great to be Poor" to quasi-Gypsy instrumentals in C minor and A minor. 

Seems like a perfect moment to plug the show, so here's the details:

WHAT:  SEETHING ACCORDIONS  with ANA BON BON, GRAYSON WALKER, and DAVID P. SMITH

WHEN:  Thursday January 26th.  Door:  7:45    Show:   8:15

WHERE:  The Forbes Street Music Club, 2614 Forbes Street, back door, basement, Victoria, BC

ADMISSION:  Suggested donation of $10 to $15

BYOB or there will be some beer for sale.

And here's Ana's bio:
You can listen to Ana Bon Bon's recordings.  They're damn fine.  You can read all about her...the swell things the critics, tastemakers, and know-it-alls say about her.  Check her out on youtube, yo. But until you're in the room with the vivacious, soulful, squeezebox squeezin' Ana Bon Bon you don't know nothin'.  Feeding on the spirits of delta blues, cabaret and vaudeville, her sensuous vocals complemented by fat accordion rhythms, she evokes the great gospel and jazz singers of yesteryear.  She taps into something deep and real, she an entertainer in the truest sense of the word, she's a ray of sunshine and a bolt of energy, she's a bon vivant......or should I say a Bon Bon vivant.
Born and raised in Vegreville, Alberta where she was introduced to the accordion at a young age, Ana spent 13 years as a mainstay of the vibrant Vancouver roots scene before jetting off to Europe to unleash the Bon Bon Revolution on the Old World.  She's back!  Ever so briefly!  Catch her at the Forbes Street Music Club while you can.

"Nodding to old blues, gospel, and tin-pan alley tunesmithing, Vancouver's Ana Bon-Bon and her full-bodied voice and accordion playing bring a vintage, bawdy-house, bon-temps vibe to life."
~Rupert Bottenberg, Montreal Mirror

Master Of The Universe/The Sad Clown - January 14, 2012

One Day At A Time was not a shoo-in last week to launch this blog and to be the first song of the year.  With both Christmas and New Year's Day falling on Sunday, I had been singing some Sunday songs....Kris Kristofferson's Sunday Morning Coming Down and the Velvet Underground's Sunday Morning.  My dark passenger liked the idea of launching the year with lyrics like...

I woke up Sunday morning with no way to hold my head that didn't hurt

And the beer I had for breakfast tasted good, so I had one for dessert

or

Sunday morning / brings the dawn in / It's just a restless feeling / by my side

Early dawning / Sunday morning / It's all the wasted years / so close behind

But One Day At A Time was the right song and I figured I'd follow up this week with a Sunday song.  Then this song reared its head.  It tumbled out of me.  Sometimes you have to painstakingly whittle a song out of a big motherfucking log. Sometimes you gotta dig it out of the ground, you might have to hose it down, or maybe  wrestle it and kick its ass around the living room a few times - this particular one jumped out of my mouth.  When that happens my theory is that it's one of two things:  one, the song blows; two, the song is tapping into my subconscious and will reveal its motives at a later date.

Guess we'll have to wait and see.  So strange to put a song out there without bouncing it off friends, collaborators, and cohorts first.  Betty-Ann heard it and she said it was alright, so here it is.

Master of the Universe / The Sad Clown

The sun topples from the sky

like a head rolls off the executioner's platform

And the moon demurely gives way

to the passage of an oncoming storm

And I lie in bed with my detached head

He's a gaseous mass, often behaves like a jack-ass

But what can be said, when the jackass is your own head

We watch the ceiling descend, pretend it's not the end

of the world

 as we know it

DON'T BLOW IT......says my head

'Cause this is your chance to finally wear the pants

Be the master of your own universe, cast of the curse

could things really get any worse

And dream and dream and dream and dream 

And dream and dream and dream and dream

The sun rises from the ashes of the night

like a canary flies up from a poisoned mine

And the sky is so insanely blue

it stages a coup d'etat in my mind

And I walk this town with my old friend the sad clown

I tell him, don't wear your heart on your sleeve, it becomes tattered and dirty

and your friends and your enemies can all watch you bleed

and though he acknowledges me, he doesn't say he agrees

when I boil it all down, I conclude he's just a sad clown

We watch the sky descend, pretend it's not the end

of the world

as we know it

DON'T BLOW IT - I say to the sad clown

'Cause this is your chance to finally wear the pants

Be the master of your own universe, cast of the curse

could things really get any worse

And dream and dream and dream and dream 

And dream and dream and dream and dream

One Day At A Time - January 8, 2012

2011.  Phew, what a year.  It was a tough one.  In fact, before going any further, a toast.....2011, suck my balls.  The concept of this blog is simple.   After an interesting, yet harrowing year musically and creatively, I found myself struggling with music....and not playing as much as I need to maintain mental and emotional well-being.  I wanted to reconnect with playing songs, simply, then be able to diffuse the songs and performances to people without playing lots of existentially bleak gigs.  Like most blogs, this is about me...but I hope it will be interesting and entertaining enough to engage you.

So I employ a simple construct.  Video/record a song a week and post it on the blog.  Rule-making in the creative arena forces artists of every stripe to be active - one of the oldest tricks in the book.  Some of them will be songs I’ve written, some covers.  There’ll be stuff about the song, info, history, lyrics, etc.   Enough chat, let’s get to it.

One Day At A Time – The Flatlanders/Willie Nelson

One Day At A Time was written by Willie Nelson and appeared on his 1965 album Country Willie – His Own Songs – but I only JUST found that out doing some research on the song!  The version I am familiar with is by The Flatlanders, a band comprised of three giants of the Texas roots scene, Jimmie Dale Gilmore, Joe Ely, and Butch Hancock, and in their first incarnation supplemented by Steve Wesson on musical saw and autoharp, Sly Rice on string bass, Tony Pearson on mandolin, and Tommy Hancock on fiddle.   One Day At A Time appears on  More A Legend Than A Band,  a 1990 Rounder re-release of the original album. It was not included for release back in 1972.   Recorded in 1971 by Shelby Singleton (Sun Studios), the promotional single “Dallas” was a commercial failure, and the album saw only limited 8-track release to fulfill contractual obligations.  It is not surprising that this fully acoustic country band with a strong tie to traditional music, a subtle psychedelic bent, and an interest in eastern religion was out of step with what was going on in Nashville in the early 70’s.  Bhagavan Decreed is no Kiss An Angel Good Mornin’.   Colin Escott writes “...the music that the Flatlanders cut that month could have come from a different planet than that emanating from every other pore of Music City.....It sported none of the lyrical contrivance or woeful over-production of much that passed for country music at the time it was recorded”

The Flatlanders reunited 30 years later and have released some albums since, but for me, this is the only one.  I have been listening to it for 20 years – it’s a record with staying power.  Dallas is “The Hit” from the record and I started performing that with the first band I was in, The Dogbreath Brothers.  This summer I was going through yet another heavy listening phase with this record and learned a few of the other songs including One Day At A Time.  I have been singing it pretty much every day for the last six weeks.  I find the chord cycle and melody meditative and what can I say about the lyrics....can spirituality and existentialism meet at a lyrical crossroad?  It is an appropriate song for the beginning of a new and better year.


******Star Date January 13, 2016:  This was my first effort and was recorded directly to the laptop through the webcam.  By the next week I had figured out a better recording system.

The Flatlanders - One Day At A Time

Here's Willie!

One Day At A Time (Flatlander version)

Chorus

I live one day at a time

I dream one dream at a time

Yesterday is dead

And tomorrow is blind

I live one day at a time

If you’re surprised to see me back at home

You don’t know how I missed you while I was gone

Don’t ask me how long I plan to stay

It never crossed my mind

I live one day at a time

Chorus

There’s a bluebird winging ‘cross a cloudy sky

He’s looking for a patch of sun, so am I

Don’t ask me how long I’ll have to follow him

Perhaps  I won’t in time

I live one day at a time

Chorus