MAT BEAUMAINS MUSIC

roadhouse ese

2010-07-19T12:29:00.005-05:00

G(ravity) Interludes

Roadhouse easy.

Contemplado.

See ya later tough guy

You'll get it right tomorrow

Stand up like your mother’s son

Now you better write this down

They don’t want you around here?

Gonna make ‘em rue this in town...

The child is amazing, see

How he puts his knuckles on the ground

If you don’t help him refine that, he’s gonna

End up in it face down

They’ll kick him into the pit

Like has happened a million times before

Imagine in him the million killed carcass

And gamely, for sport

He’ll thank you

She’ll thank you

See, you gotta pare them away

And spread the clippings

Seed their ground with your love

And let them sop the drippings

Else drop like a stone down through dense water

Or else like a tracer light

Arc and slice through the murk

& the horde to the Afterlife

Or just don’t believe; live and die

As in a harsh dry clime

Stained, cracked, warped, busted up

And in the end so quiet.

Roadhouse easy.

Contemplado.

See ya later tough guy

You’ll get it right tomorrow

They’ll thank you

He’ll thank you

He’ll thank…

She’ll thank…

They’ll thank you.

rough and tumble

2010-04-23T12:23:00.002-05:00

1. Me and Bobby McGee (Kris Kristofferson - Fred Foster)

2. Down Purgatory Falls (orig. w/drum loop)

aura lee

2010-04-18T09:11:00.002-05:00

Self with Flower and Ghost of The Blues (Mott Cromby)

1. In a ghostly kitchen, swathed in gauzy blue. Yet a yellow star still shines in the window. Looking out over the land. The blanket of the earth, viewed from on high. Yeh. You got at least that right. You got that right. The time to get alone is long overdue. What you have to do is just try not to be a fool. Just going away. Don't even know how. Yeah, why you wanted love, is the best to sure. I want to be in woods with you. I keep going, keep my vest close to my truck, to my truck. I got sidetracked from the road. Went down a path that looked alright. But I've always been comfortable, walking, on the road. And it keeps calling. Keeps calling me back. And I have to go.

2. No Woman, No Cry (Bob Marley)

3. How Come? (Mat Beaumains)

Scriptural process leads to functional abnormality
Scriptural process breeds functional abnormality

Scriptural process
Functional abnormality
Spurious juvenalia
Wanton ambition
Wandering contrition

I followed you down
I followed you down

To the ledge at the culvert

And your eyes said,
No, they pleaded,
How come?

If you want me to
I'll always be there
for you

Oh, why not?
My headscanner says
We're broken down here and
seems safe to say. And see,
anyway, all I want to do is work.

All I want to do is work.

Misty, kind of cold
I follow you down
And you let me in slow

Then we're rolling
Like the breeze

Consecrated
Like all lunatics and theives.

the magic lamp

2010-04-15T13:06:00.004-05:00

1. Phyrin Blanks (Beaumains; 1st demo)

2. Cheezymandias (ditto)

Marina

2010-04-13T07:36:00.002-05:00

Mat Beaumains: Upcoming Music

Roman English Dictionary

Marina

No fish were taken

nor harmed

nor eaten

in the making

of this

the trade

2010-04-08T10:35:00.003-05:00

1. Hawley West Hill Blues (2; w/ middle break; Beaumains) / RITFW Reprise (:40; N. Young)

Still fails to bring it all the way home but much closer now to how it's supposed to be, with maracas and harmonica. This song is more than 10 years old. Sorry to say. The title is new.

Middle:

Em - C - D

Later on in the jail cell
I reached the edge and ambled off

Wept and screamed for the CC camera
And I would not stop

So when the cops had had enough
They strapped me down in this chair

Said, "You are not Jesus, kid.
No. We do not care!"

I said, "I am The War Prophet.
I lay exposed to the sky

like blood lilies in a graveyard."
And it turns out I was right.

Extemporaneous Song Fragments

2. Olly Olly Oxen Free (Beaumains)

The kids used to say, "Olly olly oxen free!"

But we're not kids.

3. Wayne, I Like The Cut Of Your Jib (Beaumains)

E - Bflat

Wayne, I like the cut of your jib.
I've never had a more fortunate beer.

4. I Told You (Beaumains)

G

I told you a long time ago what I would do.

West Hill Blues

2010-04-05T15:39:00.003-05:00

1. Hawley West Hill Blues (Orig. - rough demo)

I been thinking back to the time of us
What we could not have; I was so lost
Want to see you on Sunday up the hill at
Stump Sprouts. Wear your red dress,

Your wedding best. At your mother's house
cats were sprawled on the floor.
Ripple leaves, and whisper
Summer night on the screen door

I nearly lost my mind in a Georgia jail
That was my payback for treating you like Hell

Please don't be sad...
The gods are only teasing.
Nothing is hard
Everything's easy

Woke up Thanksgiving Day
Hit the road with my Gibson
Got bounced out of an Exxon
And started up Rt. 91

Walkin' close to the guardrail
Schizophrenia in shattered glass
I threw away my coat
I threw away my ax

Saw a woman in a black gown
Crept low in the grass
Cops got me next exit,
Overdosed on the past...

2. The Wreck Of The Edmund Fitzgerald (Gordon Lightfoot)

Need more harmonicas. Need more electric guitar. Need more sunlight. Need more air

Old Self

2010-03-31T22:54:00.005-05:00

6:45

I like maracas and harmonicas and Stratocasters. Yet I listen to this in the light of day and find it sounds...a little...warped...

1. Prelude (Improv.)

2. Myself (Orig.)

3. Gloria (Cover)

...back to the music stand...

Will I see you tomorrow?
I feel different today...
I was moved by your being here;
Toward what, I can't say...

Myself is all I have
Myself is all I am

Too much, I always want too much...
Always needed too much...
But so what if I did?

Another Evangeline (EQ)

2010-03-30T11:29:00.006-05:00

4:22

Evangeline, do I really need to tell you
What I've been doing, what I've been working on?

Evangeline, would it even do any good?
Yes, she said, but I don't care. Least not for you.

I said, I have not care for you too. There's a time for getting
older, there's a time for getting younger too.

But what I meant to do in this song
Is no kind of funny. I need to make some money

Before it all ends...

Who don't...

[Guitar solo. Way too far back in the quote unquote mix, I know, I know.]

Blue Matter (1 and 2)

2009-12-31T12:03:00.002-05:00

Mat Beaumains' Blogcast #1

2009-12-14T14:09:00.003-05:00

---> Early December Jitterbuggin'

* Rip Reins' Reprise (w/ butchered lyrics)

* Welcome Remarks w/ Goofy Sponsor Break

* Beaumains' Walkin' Blues

* Introduction to The Guitar Stylings of Mr. Charles Mercygraft

* More Introductory Remarks Evidently in The Style of B.B. King

* A Fragmentary Blues Apparently About Taking Something (It) "Slow"

* Ten Years' Blues

* Another Goofy Sponsor Break w/ Doubletalk

* Bonus! Woodshed Cut-off Selection: Smoke Broken Methods (a 9/11 song)

---> 'Free Swim'

* Instrumental Blues Jam in E. (You gotta do it, see.)

---> Dept. of Shits & Grins: Gear Discussion Addendum

* Cheesy guitar playing (possibly a bore) / Guitar effects unit tryout. Ends @ 6:20

* Gear Discussion: DigiTech RP90 guitar effects unit; Boss MicroBR digital recorder; Fender Super 60 tube amplifier.

* "Jimi Hendrix Mode"

* "The 'Yes' Tone"

* "Guitar players will cut you apart."

* Goofy sponsor breaks

* "No."

* "I bought this thing. This thing has a chip in it."

* "Dewey" wah blues tones

* "Baffled"

Rip Reins' Ode (2)

2009-11-28T16:02:00.003-05:00

Root Lyrics

Triggering Towns

2009-11-26T07:20:00.002-05:00

Verses:

When the blues start traveling
You strike out for the triggering towns to the North
If the truth is too withering
Don't lie down with her graceless shape forlorn
If the trees in your darkest mind start to flame in the night
You can still try to dream

If the tide is ripping you adrift from a slip
Between raucous and wasted wharves
There's a wavelength where sanity's boatswain can save you
But don't raise your mast in a storm
On the sea, on a darkling night, phosphorescence may soothe you
By the light of the moon

If the grey sky's tainted your days and your thoughts
Seek the light like a graveyard cross
If this old town's pattering prophets enrage you
Take flight like the birds aloft
Drop you seeds on a windy night when the summer's calling
Let the world do it's work

Middle:

Cut away now to your truest face
Don't fade now, it's too late in the day
Take the stage now with your truest visage
You're safe now, you'll be OK

Fall in now with you selfsame drummer
The beating heart that you know
Fall in now with a marching cadence
You know just where to go

You know...

Simple Simon

2009-11-18T12:00:00.003-05:00

Verses:

I've got a crazy partner
I should not pretend that I do not know
He's got a crazy heart
And he's killing me behind the door

And I'm in no position
To pretend that I do not know
He is not forgiven; if he says he is
Then it's all a show

Man. I've got a creepy feeling
He's got an appetite I do not know
He's gone voracious starkers
And the only thing he wants is more

And there is no derision
That could knock him from the high he's on
He's says he's gonna mainline freely
That he's tired of laying low

He's says there'll be no division
Let my dendrites be tenterhooks
I keep a noble fire
Like that one from so long ago

Chorus:

Simple Simon understands:
Childhood's a broken teacup.
Simple Simon understands:
What you do. Life is like a racetrack

Middle:

You say you can't understand
Why I would live my life that way
With hair and clothes of a transient
That I could never make that pay

I could never be the architect
I could never understand the plan
But I don't want to have an argument
I don't want to call down your wrath

Last words:

So I proselytized on the bus.
Everything I got, everything I got.

Demos: Death of War Prophet / geology blues

2009-11-15T02:09:00.011-05:00

Death of War Prophet -- lyrics.

Geology Blues -- lyrics.

shapes of 3

2009-11-13T09:51:00.000-05:00

Hollis lives upstairs in the stable;

says he's a Houyhnhym

That's not funny

He's on the run from his Masters

And if he's caught, they'll skin him

That's not funny

He hates Led Zep and The Beatles

Because he wasn't in 'em

That's not funny

Ah, the shapes of yesterday

Not for nothing

But it all runs away

Like blood. Or water

Or blood in

water

***

I've got a crazy partner

I should not pretend that I do not know

He's got a crazy heart

And he's killing me behind the door

And I'm in no position

To pretend that I do not know

He is not forgiven; if he says he is

Then it's all a show

Man. I've got a creepy feeling

He's got an appetite I do not know

He's gone voracious starkers

And the only thing he wants is more

And there is no derision

That could knock him from the high he's on

He's says he's gonna mainline freely

That he's tired of laying low

He's says there'll be no division

Let my dendrites be tenterhooks

I keep a noble fire

Like that one from so long ago

***

Childhood is as a broken teacup.

creepy eating blues

2009-11-11T11:42:00.002-05:00

got to get some:

carrot cake

chicken fried steak

shake and bake

pork loin

pork shoulder

pork rub

I want you

to rub my

pork

the compulsive mind

wants to:

salivate

masticate

penetrate

venerate

degenerate

anything but wait

I can't wait

I have

to have

you

sticktoitiveness

2009-11-09T11:09:00.002-05:00

you need the sticker in the guts,
the pot boiler, the flying vaseline, excelsior,
so: maybe you have learned to hang
a bit more chevalier

but woof. yow. the scullery.
the galley. and I just keep looking
out the window. just keep looking
at the sun outside splicing cool and chill

on the air. I want
to get
out
there; dig?

who

2009-11-05T12:33:00.005-05:00

Ambrosia: tactics spent and burnt
Tacitus said because they didn't know better
they called it Civilization
when lo it was part of their slavery.

I can dig that. Like I can dig
obsidian eyes lambent in dopamine
swirling above the stage
In glittering synesthesia

Who could sustain one thought
For all eternity?
Who would?
You know who.

You know.

the good stuff

2009-11-04T14:10:00.001-05:00

always want a word like "byzantine"
moutharchitecting some chattery flowchart
pitch simmering thought miasma
and yet the good stuff
is like

prairie face (never)

2009-11-03T12:03:00.004-05:00

(Goiterneck
Sludgefoot
Melontesticle
Billowcaul

A billowing call...

Broken feet
Mendax...Mendacitor!

That's what they called him
(that's what they called me)
That's what they called him
(yeah that's what they called me)

Moonshine traveler
Insanity cousin, chainsmoking
Gluehearted
Bellyshaved

Fool and Ghoul Broker
of Most Warped Mendelism!

That's what they called him
(that's what they called me)
That's what they called him
(yeah that's what they called me)

(yeah)
(yeah yeah yeah)

I make a soft pillow
From whatever I can get...
I make my highwayside offerings
From wherever I can stand...

NEVER

Hell. What?
I know it makes no difference to you
(You’re the outsider)
What I do
(You’re the outsider)

So I, I’m just content to sit
(You’re old)
With my old hands composed
(Not composed)
Over this plate and wait and feel
If you’re gonna weigh back to where you came…
(Never)

I’ll take a small triumph from whatever I can get
(Can’t get much)
I can hear the cars out
I can hear the cars out on 96
Where you going?
I know it don’t bode well for you
Looking to get your kicks
(Already got them, honey)

Oh well.
(Learning to love them kicks)
Guess I’ll shit-kick out of here.
(Ah, yeah)
No one gets out of here alive.
I know you’ve heard that before, too.

But hey....

new day

2009-11-01T06:35:00.002-05:00

the world is full of sin and mordant depravity.
and human beings are ludicrous apes. now
this is the first thing you say upon waking.
and you know it not to be true. what is true?
true means level. you say a beam is true,
or a cut, or person. you say they are true blue

now you want to go walking outside and there are leaves
on the ground and they are many as the people are many
they plummet, twirl and cluster as do the people?
what a shitty metaphor. well, you try. but have you been?
I am now. Oh I surely am now. but you know what that Great
Man said about trying

the morning is full of light of one kind or another. I say now
that there is no sinister light, not the moon certainly, I don't know
maybe if you were looking down into a volcano
perched on the rim like a carapace
or I guess I mean parapet
but carapace is interesting,
interesting that that would have occured to me to say
because I think I have none

well this is all but for dithering

but. here is an idea:

the grey mist

2009-10-28T09:14:00.001-05:00

and water is the landscaper; you step out on that runway every morning; bear it every morning; feel it moving every morning; The runaway runway; I am a fast hand on a cliche; So what? So aren't you? it's a passthrough. this here is just a passthrough

mah mah mouth it

2009-10-27T08:15:00.001-05:00

You always mouth it up so much.
You'd kill for that boy's touch
Mash it out and walk away.
Come back again some other day.

Urge the mind.
Nursery rhymes.
Cursive line.
Urgent times.

>>>

Mott Cromby

2009-07-17T12:21:00.002-05:00

Walks off into the pale mist.

See you later.

serendipity to the maximum

2009-07-01T11:42:00.002-05:00

serendipity to the maximum
comes around for me
every time I get into this mood
where I want to reclaim my life
and be fulfilled

I think it might be God

Clandannat Road

2009-06-30T09:50:00.001-05:00

The gas stations explode down on Clandannat Road
I am high above drinking on the cliffs
Where Chactaqualqa laid his risen bones
A thousand years ago this moonrotten night

the bee

2009-06-18T09:04:00.001-05:00

I've got you now
(The shell of a bumblebee
woven allongside my path)
Oh, I've got you now

I see now, I see more clearly now
The way. Your way.
Who has not sinned in pride?
Who has not sinned, so many times?

Intercalary

2009-05-20T10:30:00.001-05:00

I don't know if I really want to own all the old blog content I've vacuumed in here; a lot of it is really bad writing; but own it I do. It is for my own past present and future plunder is what I say.

Nipwilliger Troll, what you gonna do?

2009-04-29T10:01:00.002-05:00

Nipwilliger Troll
How'd you get that weird name?
And your delusional sense of mission?
And your wholly irrational concept of a game?

I was graced with it by the Spastacualqa
When they cleansed my brain
In their cleansing light
By their cleansing rain

Nipwilliger Troll
What you gonna do?
How you gonna get money?
How you gonna get food?

Procure shelter
and worldly resources
What you ever
gonna do?

Spastacualqa
En Rentinqulum
provides me
with everything I need

All I do is think of things
And they are revealed
To me via the conduit
of your greed

your species' greed
your hunger
your need
on these things I feed

Nipwilliger Troll
You're a homeless begger
Or a captain of industry
Or a frat guy at a kegger

Or a fisherman at sea
Or a convict in a cage
Or a good man locked in sin
Or a conductor on a stage

Shifting shape
like blood
blooming in water
blue and cool

or blood blooming
on the pavement
from your spittle
lip and drool

Nipwilliger Troll
What you gonna do?
How you gonna get money?
How you gonna get food?

I am graced by the Spastacualqa
When they cleanse my nightly brain
In their cleansing nightsome light
By their cleansing nightsome rain

standing by the highway side

2009-04-28T09:53:00.002-05:00

standing by the highway side
beneath the arch of the sun
I'm gonna be that guy
I'm gonna be that one
travelin dude who walks from tree to tree to tree
like Johnny wayback Appleseed

standing by the highway side
in the baking sun
I'm gonna be that guy
past the years I've shunned
with head chills crashing an ocean wave
your Atlantic master your soul could still save

Real
you gotta
make it real
you gotta
cut the deal
With yourself
once

and for all

on the move

2009-04-24T08:11:00.002-05:00

we are on the move
we are burning crude
like that Walking Dude
we are on the move

get up or lay down
get a cut of the deal yo
you get cut you get real yo
get a cut of the deal you

we are on the move
we are burning crude
like that Walking Dude
we are on the move

Paranoia Downs

2009-04-23T13:48:00.001-05:00

Your ashen gaze, no mystery
What this world does
is leach all your colors.
Leaves you wrinkled and scag

You imagine a pond here
A tree here
Some land of your own
And a view into time

The horizon, your line
You walk in design
Survey it and go
Survey it and go

Dark hands have fallen
they smite the stray
those cursed from the land
those lost from the way

you gotta walk a mile in my shoes to get out here
you gotta walk a mile in my shoes to get out here
you gotta walk a mile in my shoes to get out here
you gotta walk a mile in my shoes to get out here

the universe is here

2009-04-23T13:06:00.001-05:00

walking up the road
in profound gravel
this birch tree for gavel
this one for to swing

Josie clammed up for years
But now hear her sing
In her moonshine and twilight
For her flowers I bring

the universe is here
the universe is here
the universe is here
the universe is here

in the constellation of the pines

2009-04-23T09:53:00.001-05:00

in the constellation of the pines
you check your satchel, you check your stash
you brought the whiskey
you brought the cash

your hair is grey
your heart is brown
your house is burned
and you've been shunned from town

in the constellation of the pines
as you plot your revenge
as your blades you whet
o you of the town

you will get yours
yet

the blueprints

2009-04-15T15:36:00.002-05:00

the blueprints? yes I have them here. why?
no they do not delineate marginal interests
yes they include instructions on how to fly

yeh and no not just in dreams. equinoxes are what they seem
or yes they are. doggerel in a dirigible. indivisible; everything washed in blue
all the prints, all the tinctures. they were sepia now they're in blues

sepia old; blue, new. like the blues in you. the blueprints, yes. I have them
Never mind the payroll
that is what

he is for
that is what
he gets paid

to worry about

Death of War Prophet

2009-03-24T10:34:00.005-05:00

A cold dark night in a weird dark summer
You feel the lightning rising in the sky?
The night burns green.
What could it mean?
Could it mean that a king has died?
Could it mean that the Internet has lied?

The War Prophet came riding over the hillside
He only had one horse between his thighs
The other 4 horses left he left for Jesus Christ
The War Prophet knew his price
He knew he was not like Christ
Not yet

He came thundering over the hillside
Lightning shooting from his eyes
And long across the purple plain
You could see the farm house fires glowing
Men and women, girls and boys
Heads exploding from the noise
The War Prophet had looked too hard at the horizon
And the U.S. government saw him as Satan from his hell arising

His name was Lucius Cole
And he was just a kid
As he watched the bombs drop
And as he watched the bodies drop

They cut their throats on the plane.
9 months of rain.
The bodies rained down.
The bombs rained down.
9 months of rain.
And 9 more again

Standing there in the farmhouse fires' glow
Lucius Cole, a young man only recently reclaimed
From the maladies of the lost and shamed
From the maladies of a bastard name
Yet he knew he had to go
to the house of Washington

So he hit the road
He rode with the drovers
He rode in the dead trains among the corpses
And from the farmhouse living
He borrowed horses
And they gave him bread
And they gave him beer

In spite of a dark and murderous time
He saw Lincoln in their faces
(Abe, Honest Abe)
And in the sky bright flames
and burning roses

The majesty of the night
The blue and purple night
The cosmos like a caul
Blue and purple light

Who do you love?

Lucius Cole of the blood flag red
Lucius Cole of the blood flag red
Lucius Cole of the blood flag red
Lucius Cole of the blood flag red

Alienated Blues

2009-03-24T10:03:00.002-05:00

I'm thinking about Sally
and what Sally said
She said you've got no birthright
You're not a prince
It's all in your head

I keep thinking about Sally
She said you've got no kingdom here
But alas, poor Sally's dead

They came to my chair
With a box
"Get your things
and exit by the loading dock"

I walked out past the dumpster
to the median
And threw away my shoes
And socks

I scrambled down the embankment
panicked
thinking about changes
and locks

I've got 47 dollars here
Think I'll go spend it on some Boone's
I've got 47 dollars here
Think I'll go spend it on some Boone's

Walk down past the culvert
Sit and drink by the river
all afternoon

I'm thinking about Sally
and what Sally said
She said you've got no birthright
You're not a prince
It's all in your head

I keep thinking about Sally
She said you've got no kingdom here
But alas, poor Sally's dead

The blue lights are my blues
And now your Daddy's off to jail
The blue lights are my blues
And now your Daddy's off to hell

the blue lights are my blues
such alien things
as through the universe
I moan and wail

back off the jinx

2009-03-12T16:06:00.002-05:00

you gotta take time to back off the jinx
don't overthink or think for a minute
that you are sacrosanct
in your clarity here today
which should just be normal

back off the jinx
get encoded
encrypted
in your own glossolalia
you could call it "Glosso"
like something out of a Philip Dick story
some drug the space colonists take
to make them sound
interesting
to the other robots

Canal St. Blues

2009-03-12T14:26:00.002-05:00

Woke up this morning
Felt around for my phone
Like my keys and my money,
It was gone

Don't feel like lying
to myself
for another day
so close to home.

Who wants to know is what I say
but you can call me
Old Walking John

*

I'm going to Canal St. station
Take the first Trailways bus I see
I'm going to Canal St. station
Take the first Trailways bus I see
I'll get drunk in White River Junction
Before heading up to Quebec City

*

I'll see you in the red lights
Like it's my last episode
I will see you in the red lights
Like it's my last season's episode
I've got the New York blues too
But they're fifteen years too old

expiate regret

2009-03-10T14:40:00.002-05:00

pathetic & there
is a lot going on in here;
I hope;
why would you want to post it?
no, but would
you want to get it out?;
yes; for purposes of self;
yes, I guess

Expiate regret
make your choices
let results speak for themselves
and don't talk about it;
talking about the one thing
dilutes its power
& its magic;

you not only have to know this
but also

subscribe to it.

at the chapter meeting

2009-03-03T08:35:00.002-05:00

at the chapter meeting
they wrestled the old guy to the ground
and at the chapter meeting
they said you will be ruthless and relentless
heretofore
and at the chapter meeting
outside by the water cooler
she sidled close to me
and I noted her dark hair
her green chemise
and her thigh-high
black nylons
and inside and among the actual air
at the chapter meeting
all was sepia and drab
but my screenshot indicated
a febrile land
of fervent talking animals
and scheming androids
and humans better than human
and worse than
and it was all caused by The Aliens
yeh
the chapter meeting was dope
maybe it was lies
anyway at the chapter meeting
they wrestled the old guy to the floor
and said you will be ruthless and relentless
in your one a day plus iron
and I thought
yeah, I can do that
it has begun now
it really has

begun

begun

2009-03-02T21:11:00.001-05:00

it has begun
it has

begun

the impossibility

2009-02-26T18:04:00.001-05:00

the impossibility
of even just the valve
of even just the flag
of even just to spell
and to signify
how am I gonna make you understand

I wanted the oath and I wanted
to do battle with time
no that's a lie
I rejected both
yes I do
no I don't

faced down in the field
a sandy field
leavened with dead birds
and dead worms
and a dead wood
and ash
and dead oaks

and they put a firing range back in there instead
and all the victims were deranged and depraved
but their masters made them that way
or maybe no
maybe they were good

I get so mad and vociferous
at you innocents
I am an angry sloth

I will see you
in

hell

upc

2009-02-26T08:41:00.001-05:00

remember to tell yourself all the things you said yesterday sounds like a Beatles song about the unified process theory sounds like some corporately birthed nightmare

no recompense

2009-02-26T07:49:00.001-05:00

u get:
awfully motivated
on a plane
trip out
you think,
The Mystery
The Momentum
of a Journey
but these
are just mystical
words aggrandized
cheap wages
from the mouth
nothing like
playing music
to a bare room
or a room full of
people
and there is no harmonica playing
in hotel rooms
either
no conciliation
no recompense
for all them
wasted
years

the spyware & the rabbit

2009-02-20T11:44:00.000-05:00

what sucks is having to negotiate with the spyware and the rabbit. the toolchest is the only one who know hows to farm. the embryo just wants to talk. and I am there like, do you even know keys, no you don't, there used to be a thing called a hardware store, you'd go and have them cut, but all you motherfuckers know is these cheesy magnetic swipe cards. and they don't hold a charge. oh, it's fun enought for a breakfast buffet, not quite enough for the metropolitan ballet. I'm glad I'll be in the desert

Be minor riff

2009-02-18T15:37:00.001-05:00

that B minor riff
that apocryphal riff.
but hey aint they all
in this rock game, anyway

you will be hearing it soon. you will be alive to it soon.
all you need is the words and the images.
all you need is love
all you need is just a bit more space & time

(why not just write it here, you ask? because this ain't the space for it.
falls outside the purview of this blog's methodology, if a
blog can be said
to have a purview. or a methodology

this is where I write
when I am fillin up the Internet
with other things
technicalerratachattautilimatamadhatta)

[and the Internet said....what the Internet said...]

Ride, ride, ride goes the chorus.
Or rise, rise, rise
Or hide hide hide

He said, I'm gonna let it ride, ride, ride

She said, I can feel it rise, rise, rise

She knew she gotta go hide, hide, hide

It was a shame and a crime, crime, crime

the song is the song of a boy name of Roddy. 2 boys actually
the father and the son
and their mother, Vicky Scow

it all started in the 2nd grade
out in the field where the kids would play
and down the ledge to the railroad tracks
where the days all take what they don't give back

my new methodology for songwriting is to just envision the scenes and the story while practicing the riffs and progressions
then mumble/moan some lyrics
then type them out
then repeat

Really ought to take some time
Hypomania.
Hew that rhyme

Attention deficit disorder. ADD.
it just means you think too fast

the invocation
and the pseudonym self-absorbed

create them days

clarity-centric

2009-02-13T13:43:00.001-05:00

clarity-centric
marches
out of hand
understand
master salacious
master clown
mister
hard to around you boy
well why don't you
you can
lay in now
lay low
a layover
Lord are you marching slow
in the calliope
alabaster disaster go faster Zoroaster
you lost your alibi
motion clown
a slain beast
underground motion sickness
thwarts me
the chords are rampant
latency
philately
clandestine open show
broadsword mystery

rage sage
rage sage
rage sage
rage sage

rage

a rhythm

2009-02-12T12:02:00.001-05:00

a rhythm a rhythm everything has a rhythm

and this could be:
your table
your braindump
your blueprint
your map
your lyric dump
your kinda diary

whatever

2/2 time

2009-02-12T11:43:00.001-05:00

in my head all day today why'd you it said
just like the bones of the hand let em roll out like dice
let em rule, like the shapes of the words and the sounds
of the words, the cadences of the words; there is no empty
cadence. nor coda. every winter is a coda.
there are cells and there are cells

file 313 is on again like clockwork because I say it is
like frost on steel like frost on steel
branded brand new burns like brandy that's a good burn there
just don't lose yourself underground

no

see that is where you go to find things

automatronic aural spectral lyrical: GO

2008-09-09T08:27:00.002-05:00

Look at your hand there held before you in pre-dawn blue shadows levitating over faces past, faces gone not dead just ineffable as all the past must always be barring your quantum soul, which you can't exactly know. But as you lie in bed and weep a bit in your swirling thoughts and emotions you may choose: swirling pathos or greed and need; maybe not. How about glory. Don't deny it. You want it, you buy it. There you go, spectral, passing, shifting like the brilliant X-ray shadows of clouds, vehicles of air, blueprints for earthy blood and meat and gristle. Passing through Luna's light in the electrophotoscopic night, black grey and white. Our ancesters knew the meaning of metaphysical. Channel five thousand years ago, imagine what the colors must have been like, how resplendent, how clear, imagine the cool kiss of the virgin air, imagine the sunlight, and pure dew of night, and imagine the lightning of the soul, whatever you want, you can take it, look up, yearn, want, never wane, not yet wither and stop with dithering restless, can't you see that what you can't taste or see but what you sense is your hands in the skein drawing the threads, binding the strings and twining them into the rope, into the hope that is your lifeline, your heartline, your way up, your destiny?

geology blues

2008-08-21T10:14:00.001-05:00

Open G

Feelin' low on this lonesome day
Lost my soul. O, unwholesome day.

Drift alone through the parking lots.
You can have nothing and still lose a lot.

The cops they come and send me on my way.
I circle around and go right back in again.

Into the grocery store.
Gonna eat some Christmas pie.

Free pie.
Where'd you think I'd go?

Store manager says, What're you doing in my breakroom
Eating these people's chips and soda. I said, Who wants to know?

Bucket of geodes split I left upon her porch.
Her memory burns my mind like a torch.

My mind was green crystal, hers was red.
She said, Get out of here, I wish I was dead.

Let my mind go dark.
Let my mind go dark.

Would have mined the fruits of your earth, seeded.
Worth nothing now. Blood on the hearth.

Thundereggs, oh. Sunder legs, oh.
And sever. Oh, sever.

Let my mind go dark.
Let my mind go dark.

Feelin' low on this lonesome day
Lost my soul. O, unwholesome day.

Drift alone through the parking lots.
You can have nothing and still lose a lot.

I won't stop breaking down so now leave the asphalt.
and throw myself down on the rocks

off the overpass.
Our lives shatter like glass. Fast

dispersion blues

2008-08-20T06:17:00.001-05:00

G7
down with the Obvious City blues again
down with the Onerous City blues again
I'm gonna have my drink and pretend that time's my friend
but I'm down with the OH NO City blues again

The fool aint always funny
But he's always bleeding money

I'm down with the Shiftless City blues again

Or I'm down with the Piscataqua River blues again
I'm gonna cross the bridge and check in to the Days Inn
Take my bag of drugs and my beer and lock myself in
And write an epic poem about how I lost my sweet friend

Swing low by the Lamprey River
I gave her all that I could give her

Now I'm down in the Long Lost City blues

E7
What's so great about the city?
You can lose your mind there.
Waste a lot of time there.
Fall victim to a crime there.
Or commit a crime and erase your breaking heart
(That's what the looney bin is for)

Lead me to the room,
I'll sing Rip Reins' Ode again
I've got my pack of Marlboro Reds
Let the song begin
In 14 days they will turn me loose in the rain
I'll stumble underground and sleep down by the train

The fool aint always funny
Jangle my cup for money

I'm down with the Risperidone City blues again

the deal

2008-08-19T05:42:00.001-05:00

He said: Your sign is the radio telescope
So herein emulate the electron microscope
In this blighted garden you must grow
From the blighted raindrops derive your succor, and know

Simple rhymes are gonna say it all
There's all of time, and there's right now
So control yourself this time
And expand your hope

In a dream of Buddha
I give you ideas
In a dream of white mist
I give you the deal:

You will.
Now go.

Rip Reins' Ode

2008-08-18T14:36:00.001-05:00

1. the news ticker is in the seam of the sealing orange intestines unfurling beneath by eyes it says
she is you but you aren't one of us it says boom
cold linoleum boom I guess I'll get up and do 27 pushups boom
it is dark and scary in this half lit room like when I was 2 and peed boom
I walk into the hall and there lies a body on a gurdy beneath a sheet boom
did I kill it or have I been killed
boom

2. in my Reporters' Notebook I write a fable to the traditional woods

3. the tracksuit lady one of them says to her clone he won't stay in bed
we'll give him something to fix that
they lead me back to bed and boom goes the needle in my arm
and boom so this is what it is
to be put down like
a horse

4. I awake 3 days later. they put me in a room with Marlboro Lights
and an alcoholic
it gonna be
a
long
winter

note to self

2008-08-12T04:48:00.001-05:00

a lotta lyrics here

lost it.1

2008-08-12T04:21:00.001-05:00

I can't fathom the feeling
That fades from you just like the time
When you lost love

I can't fathom stealing what saves you
To deal your own failure is like
Lost love

You had the eyes and the mouth of the tiger
And could you just die
in the lost love?

Lying awake tonight wondering how
Will I get through the times
With no lost love?

say no more

2008-08-08T10:40:00.001-05:00

You've been hurt before.
Don't want to be hurt no more.
And not by me.
I must agree.

I refer you to
Mr. Johnson.
He's on the floor
He'll play no more.
Say no more.
Good-bye.

I see your face
every place. My
breakfast bowl,
my ashtray hole.

I refer you to
Mr. House,
he's at my door.
He knows the score.
Say no more.
And good-bye.

I flee from your eyes.
Once you loved, but now despise.
Drunk and reeling on the phone,
Your Mom says, leave my girl alone.

I refer her to
Mr. Patten,
he's so tired
of being poor.
That's for sure.
I'll say no more.
Good-bye.

waste

2008-08-07T12:52:00.000-05:00

Re-deployment day is what it was and is
they said
so get into
the box
yeah
we said
get into
it
Well what
if I don't want to?
Well, we feel that you
should
and if not
Then we'll suck your
eyes out
And rape your
mind
And send your
ass
To the water
mines

The water mines?
The water mines?
This earth was once so green and cheer
A cerulean pearl
Petrarch knew that and so
did Manet
But now we give you
a nightmare
saltmarsh
dream of ancient Egypt
People turning into beasts
doghead beasts
Beasts turning into people
into your rulers
and now
the smell of shit
your own shit

zap goes the lightning
and you're back sitting in traffic
the person driving by
on the other side like a bug
made out of dough
and that is
what you look like to them
if they were looking
or if they were

alive

of the blood flag red

2008-08-07T05:47:00.001-05:00

His name was Lucius Cole
And he watched the bombs drop
And he watched the bodies drop

Standing there in the farmhouse fires' glow
He knew he had to go
to Washington

So he rode a bike
And he rode in the sick's cars
And he rode in the dead train among the corpses
And from the farmhouse few living
He borrowed horses

He saw Abe Lincoln in the faces
And in the sky flames and dead roses

Lucius Cole of the blood flag red

Now and forever

2008-08-07T05:43:00.000-05:00

Archives is all busted up, so operations here shift over to File 313 for now and forever.

folk songs

2008-08-06T12:46:00.001-05:00

A cold dark time
You feel the thunder rising in the sky
The lightning burns green
What could it mean?
Could it mean
that the king has died?
Could it mean
that the Internet
has died?

They cut their throats on the plane.
The bodies rained down
Burning
Smoking
9 months of rain
And 9 more again

I was underground in their jails,
I watched it happen on TV.

I said to the convicts around me,
wraiths
Will you follow me

I can't be killed

***

if I
had another care
another chance
for change
I'd call this page Raw
and another Song
and another Age
and maybe so
so maybe
I will
because the easiest thing
in the world
is to send these
missives
along
these songs
are invocation:

Mott Cromby lives

It must

folk song

2008-08-06T12:43:00.000-05:00

Invocation

2008-08-06T10:32:00.000-05:00

did I

2008-08-06T10:30:00.001-05:00

play it
on a cloudy
Strat
called Patience
you know I did

write it in
a fast
notebook
feeling
my head in
the turning page

you know I did

pop

2008-07-09T08:23:00.001-05:00

This space needs to
come back up
this space needs to
be open to me
and to
my mind

to the thoughts of my mind

*

superstition is/is not
in the equation
of this Anthrocene age

?

ponder your infinities

*

you mouth
anything up and
it drains all away
it blows all away
you mouth up the rain
then the fishing
goes grey
still, my guitar hand
is strong today
and come what may
I hope stronger
tomorrow and tomorrow
and tomorrow
now is the summer
of our main intent
tone. is all in
the fingers, in
the hands
in the lines
and in
the strings
oh, good job.
I will say more

tomorrow

but remember
mouth anything up
and it all
goes
away

2007-12-11T14:28:00.000-05:00

I'm a lay down for the train
go up like propane
like cocaine
like inverse
kleptomaniac
lint garden
in my obverse
hybrid
dessicated
sauerkraut
proboscis

I'm running a theft ring
out the back door of the Salvation Army

he screamed
into the ruins
of his coffee
cup

shattered there on the floor

2007-12-11T14:19:00.000-05:00

shipped out
to the containment and relocation center
to be
shaved
tagged
frozen
packaged
and launched into oblivion

see what your comet hath wrought

*

I am devoting the rest of this blog to crazy
like back in the good ole days

why the fuck not

I think you will like it
better

2007-11-02T09:14:00.000-05:00

embrace your blues
when they are
all you've got

2007-11-01T13:30:00.000-05:00

you disappear into it and it transforms you

*

resist being waylaid by behavioral incongruities

*

all them mistakes you made make for a lotta blues

2007-10-31T12:25:00.000-05:00

I am an expert in making myself feel bad

2007-10-30T15:32:00.000-05:00

must do better must do more must

flip benighted

2007-10-30T13:38:00.001-05:00

The hard frost cobalt
as my pace, theme and rhythm.
Myopia wins.

ones and twos

2007-10-30T13:30:00.001-05:00

Never mind your blues.
Let the day be your water.
Time is but a blade.

distance

2007-10-30T11:03:00.001-05:00

The morning moon rises.
My harbinger is elected,
Imminent calliope.

ripped

2007-10-23T12:18:00.000-05:00

He sidled into the club
With that singular sense of self
That in the past was just smashing
His head into some fuckin wall,
bescrawled
above a urinal

smash it in there
shithead
where'd that
get you before

it got me a ticket
that said
I quit,
I'm afraid
To play
with the big folk

I'm a flea
The eagles
don't fly for me

Right turn, Clyde.

2007-10-23T12:15:00.001-05:00

Phyrin Blanks found his voice yesterday
(finally)
Heaped under a pile
Of myth and allegory
At least he thought he found it
Never can be too sure
The world might say,
"It sounds fake to us."
Anyway,
How many more times can I lose this key?
Thought Phyrin,
while behind him, beyond
The pine and thistlestraw berm
That couched in his backyard
The long highway
rumbled and hissed
Same as yesterday,
And the day before,
and you get the picture;
Phyrin did. He took a pull
of Paisano
and mused:
The need to be technical,
he said to himself,
Technical expertise,
yeah,
so that's it
You've got to be so technical
if you want to maintain that easy inward way
Your own counsel kept,
not quite a secret,
Just invisibly trying to admit that
further reality
blue and silver
gold and red
aurally
arranged and fed
you gotta Let It In
to arrive at that weirdly
elusive yet no longer
deferred vista
That the all the world's
ambivaloids
but also the good folks at home
Just aint seen.

The hand that mock'd them and the heart that fed

2007-10-22T13:49:00.000-05:00

Cheezymandias crows to the girls:
I'm all grown now,
and ready to glint
away nightly
like the purple cosmos,
that sparkly span
so vast and clean,
rolling out
across the iron desert

His shirt pocket leaking
amber petals, a red rain
trailing at his feet
of mossy green,
He says, I am replete
With the new information;
I have the magic lamp.
Rub it and see
Me as I am,
For once
and all

Far down below
that vast plateau
in the town
of darkling night
the ambivaloids,
cowl and shawl,
tend to their
minor mead
and cornstock,
kettles,
biding time,
laughing over that one fool,

that drunk damned fool,
did you see him?
he lost his shoes,
must have thrown them away.
drunk damned fool,
stems and mites all in is hair.
Look at him passed out there
beside the wash,
lolling
glassyfaced in the hedge
just past the old school,
scrabbling for his greasy
specs

Well, that aint our Cheezy.
Not no more.
No. Our hero learned about 100 years ago
All about the crashing and the burning
And the lashing and the yearning and the cashing in on
A certain singular but outlandish understanding
of
(drum roll please
but no. Cheezy don't kiss and tell
no more
and won't kiss
and tell
no more,
no nevermore)

Shit. 11 years.
I say
that's a long fuckin time
for to be down
in the blink of an eye.
Yeah yeah yeah
And all of that
And all of that
But those should have been good years
For to have cut from your hide
But no,
Mr. Hide, oh no, Mr. Hide
long time there, Mr. Hide,
long time there, buddy,
Love you long time,
Mr. Hide,
Me love you long time
Mr. Hide,
Mr. Hide,
Mr. Hide
Me love you long time,
Mr. Hide

Cue that guitarissimo

Oh,
11 years, up and walking like a man
11 years, up and walking like a man
Say hello to Satan
Give him your right hand
And the blues fell mama's child
And it tore me all upside down;
And the blues
Is an aching old heart disease
And if you aint ever had it,
I hope you never will

Anyway,
11 years comes crashing down
from out the balcony
But flipping catlike
at the last,
he claims the stage,
11 years
gone and down
and back and up again from eating sand
And being like, Me no understand???
And all like that.
No:
Now he's up and grinning like a fox
on furlough,
a very fox,
and one on furlough.

ah, the grief the love the rage
the needless rage,
the heedless rage
the baseless breedless rage,
and fuck,

page after self-indulgent
page
after page after page
they all drift away now
Like ashes
On autumn smoke,
a bonfire,
October leaves,
Burning.
Take a toke before you...

Cheezy now,
come on now
Cheezy now.

Come storming back
upon your thunderous steed,
no mere mare or stallion but
a bronco of deep maroon and gold,
and you with your guitar slung low,
just like one of the breed,
just like Mr. Chain Blue Lightning
hisself,
the very same

Get the wine and get the mead,
9 million barrelsful,
Quickly now,
it's a gonna be a feast,
a return unlimited engagement
of 11 thousand nights
or 11 million shows,
whichever comes shambling first
from out and down along
that dusty cimarron road,
surging and shimmering
clear away
and gone
from the past

2007-10-18T10:36:00.000-05:00

the great engine is getting up in the morning
and etching yourself onto the day
can't you understand that
once and for all
and never forget?

the great engine is all that you do
nothing more, nothing less
can't you understand that now
once and well
never again to forget?

wheeling birds
wheeling stars
wheeling embers
fireflies
twilight
thoughts
human energies
whatever's all
in the sky
in the night
in the light
is the great engine
the one true
you and you

can you understand that
once now and
again?

oh, I just remembered

2007-10-18T10:30:00.001-05:00

that the grind gets exponentially easier if you just listen listen listen to all the music all the music you can find for fuh fuh fucking free on the fucking Internet while you grind it; never mind easier it is the only way to bear it, the grind

this is a tandem thing now

I'd like to post some songs here

soon's I get my shit digital

*

art megalomania
was never a good
trip

2007-10-18T08:46:00.000-05:00

grind grind grind this is a grind grind grind you've got to grind grind grind
to get through to the open land
cantankerous glutton you're a hard guy to feel sorry for
went back and read your letters and I have to say
they did not feel like me and they did not move me
you need to pen yourself a slogan that can wrap up the pas
match yourself like you are gas

*

patterns, I see what you mean about the patterns.
the great debt, the great karmic debt. the reds
the whites
the blues
the blacks
and green and gold

momentary blasts of eternity
sound
that's some slab
boy
that's some chunky
(come again?)

*

the old old ways the old old ways
signal back, indicate
show don't tell
don't feel like hell
don't drink too much
don't think too much
lurk
work
don't
be a
jerk

*

some things you should crush out dead
like your last cigarette
and other things you think you've killed
you realize later can never die
never go away
these things that are a part of you
that are more than just you
I'm talking about the big picture
the big groove
the big spinning platter
round and round
cathedral canyons
craters
of sound

*

it is a storytelling device
and a meditative device
and your dogged savior
it is
your guitar
and you own
it

2007-10-09T15:43:00.000-05:00

they don't believe it and she don't believe it none of them can see it but I have always been able to see it when I have looked for it and what's more now is that can see it as I hear it and do it. only he knew who he was dealing with. it was ok. lots of people had the same knack. the thing was to blow out the whole huge tapestry and panorama. i said for me it is mainly a narrative tool, a tool for the waking dream. there is a lot that goes into it, a lot of absorbing. to take notes on it like this and like those over there is really really boring and not cool why do you do it well it is just a way in on a tired day but you know what they say practice makes the man they never believed him they thought he was crazy because it drove him that way once but he believed it and it was an act of belief that sealed it

oh fuck it can't you see that I'm just trying to purge out the page

crude and humble Aslan Billy Bibbit analog tapes Radio Shack the blues personal shapes own your influences be that human song yeah yeah yeah it went yeah yeah yeah and no no no

there it is there it is

2007-10-09T15:24:00.000-05:00

forty lines, he said
alright you write em and I'll sing em up for ye
no, he said you've got to sing them in the cave
what cave
the cave by the meadow
what meadow
the meadow by the blacksmith's
what blacksmith
aren't you the blacksmith?
no, the only thing I've ever been handy
with around the house is a guitar
look at these fabulous lithe long-legged creatures
I can't see them
you have to be asleep to see them
asleep where
asleep on the berm overlooking the road
5 am creeping slow in the snow
the new morning snow
good night kid you got a long
way to go till morning but let
that song be your light
red blue and green
synesthesian late bloomer
is all I have been
forget that past
put in in a webcast
lash yourself to the mast
and give them the show
pseudonymous
pure
hidden
obscure
and with
terrible allure

2007-10-09T15:18:00.000-05:00

you too can be an anonymous loser
with rage problems
and a pseudonymous champion
and echo channeler
it's easy all you gotta do is
believe and stop cursing it

I shaved into the face of radio

2007-10-09T13:45:00.000-05:00

Pixillated by decibels
They all got crazy themed
In the synesthesia
They all got clinical
Lycanthropy in the masts
They all got subsumed jejune
In mercenary gloom
They all said terrible things
Screamed them really
In the three forty a m

And it was all because of fear
And burnout and fear of burnout
And it was all in the song
Of her and for her and another
For her and
You changed the names but
Not the ideas; you shaved into

To the face of a late bloomer and said
Hey, at least I still got

My radio

woah now

2007-10-09T13:38:00.000-05:00

that was fast
I have so much to tell you about
and so much left to tell

does it

2007-10-09T13:37:00.000-05:00

still respond

yes it does

it was a good age

for soulful introverts

suoena ropmetxe

2007-07-19T14:41:00.001-05:00

need to change strings all
damn if I aint been the 50 dolla beeter
of hot sweaty
i used to what happened
you could all day till shred
it still wouldn't what's
going to get is else
and cares who if you playin
it's I do these but no
tired cube boring cube this is
don't you how I should
just go now want
now good no this
then
transform
no
delete

every fifth word

saltare

2007-07-17T14:37:00.001-05:00

Woodshed One (WS1) closed with my purchase of a sweeeeeeet used Martin DCM acoustic-electric, bought in the western part of the state, just over the mountain, where I seem to get all my good guitars and dogs. I ought to move there some day.

An account of buying the guitar and moreover all that led up to it is something that might bear more telling here. But not today.

As WS1 closes, my hands and ears are back in it.

Now for my mind and dreams.

Thereby, by the power vested in this File of 313, i.e. the spot exegesis of the forthcoming ode and canticles of MaughtPassaconnaCraughmby, I herewith declare by THIS word that Woodshed Two (WS2) is now officially on.

Wherein I reach for and attain new, unforeseen levels of acumen compentency ability technique execution and all that good stuff

Stamina. Stamina is your watchword and key. In performance and in outlook.

Hold. Hold.

musicthewordsoundsjustlikemusicmusicthewordsoundsjustlikemusicmusicthewordsoundsjustlikemusicmusicthewordsoundsjustlikemusicmusicthewordsoundsjustlikemusic

be more like the dolphin

2007-07-17T14:01:00.001-05:00

The same experiment was repeated with humans, and it took the volunteers about the same length of time to figure out what was being asked of them. After an initial period of frustration or anger, the humans realised they were being rewarded for novel behaviour. In dolphins this realisation produced excitement and more and more novel behaviours - in humans it mostly just produced relief.

and again

2007-07-17T08:35:00.001-05:00

Advice for gentlemen:

Fuck your wife, but don't fuck with your wife.

Meta-cognition, the old thinking about the thinking, uh huh, that's the spark for it

The quest. The quest.

the keys

2007-06-21T11:25:00.001-05:00

The keys are within you; you need only to find them.

your word of the day

2007-06-07T09:00:00.001-05:00

It's all about passion, boys and girls. And being passionate. Finding that passion for that particular thing -- whatever it is for you -- and holding on it. Feeding it.

That is all.

*

The three visual artists I was ever real friendly with (2 guys I used to run with and 1 girl who broke my heart all to pieces) were all kind of ruthless characters. Brilliant, charming and ruthless. Fucking Capricorns all. Probably not, but it sounds better that way. I speak to none of them now. I like to find them online though, from time to time, to see what they're up to (they're all still in the game, big time). Creepy, right? And pathetic. Taboo even, in a certain sense. I still admire them all, but I think it's very likely that all of them think rather poorly of me -- if they even think of me at all. For various reasons and causes that I'm not real proud of. The one guy, a sculptor, I'm afraid he might think I owe him money, back from a deposit on an apartment we once held (which in fact I might, but I mean... hell); the other guy, the abstract expressionist (but also a hell of a draftsman and also a hell of an opportunist), I was friendly with at that particular point in time when I went batshit crazy for a few days and some ugly drama ensued; the girl who aspires to paint like this guy, well, I tried to give her those paintings back, she insisted I keep them out of some misplaced sense vanity, and I subsequently wrecked 'em in a drunken fit of rage and self-immolating despair. Then told her all about it. Nice guy, huh? For all of that, we parted on better terms than could have been expected, but then a few years later I drunk dialed her a couple of times, and for that I am ashamed because it is LAME.

But to hell with all that. What guy aint done that a time or two? (If you say it's you, I say you're lyin'.)

the word

2007-06-05T15:50:00.001-05:00

1:49 pm

You need to think about this every day: that the word is what you're involved in, is what's paying the bills. And so it should pay the bills.

No matter what happens, your involvement with the word is key. Will be key.

The word has distinguished many a song. Never forget that.

It is an Alvarez Regent dreadnaught that I bought from a guy around here for $55. He had it advertised on craigslist last Friday along with a bunch of other guitars and parts of guitars and other junk.

Now, the first decent acoustic guitar I ever owned was an Alvarez. I think I must have traded it away eventually toward a better guitar. But I always liked that first guitar, even though the nut eventually came to buzz.

The guitar I got Friday has been put back together better than perhaps it first was, or so I like to think. The guy could certainly have sold it for more than he did. He could have asked more for it; but, that he didn't was part of the charm of the whole thing, the whole arrangement. It all seemed, as they say, meant to be.

The key thing is, these old Alvarez models have solid spruce tops and real rosewood fretboards. This is a big deal. A crack in the top of the guitar has been meticulously repaired (you can hardly see where); and the heel of the neck finely cut and re-glued.

The fucking thing has .012's on it and has had for over a month, according to the guy, and it seems solid as a rock. It's not a piece of junk; it's a real instrument, albeit a cheap one. And everyone's gotta have at least one cheap one, a beater. There is a certain charm to the cheap ones, a certain ineffable charm. Because if you can make it all sound real and right on cheap one, well, then you know you're onto something.

Yeah, it's my beater. But I could tell right away, in that way that you always can, from the very first E played, that the thing had some song in it. It's also my lone 6-string acoustic at this point. And I'm hanging on to it. I'm taking it camping next month, sure. Also, it means I can work on getting me fingerstyle chops together. Also, now I don't feel so antsy to spend 3x as much on a brand new cheap guitar. Oh no: I'd like the next 6-string I get to be a good one. A real good one. Like this one. Till then…

But I'm fucking kicking myself for ever selling off that old Taylor. How could I have? But I sure did. Because I quit, I fucking quit for years, I gave up, gave it all up, gave everything up, resigned, became resigned, gave in to my own complacency, chickened out, backed out, shut it down, shut it away.

And now I'm back.

And that is the great lesson: that you can come back, you can bring it back, you can bring yourself back, you can rise anew, you can return more powerfully than anyone could have ever imagined.

Like he said.

*

When I walked up to the dude's house last Friday eve, the dude with the guitar, the living room was pungent with the scent of incense, like he'd just smoked a fattie.

Too bad he didn't know exactly who he was dealing with. I'd have brought a six-pack of Coronas or fifty extra dollars, or what have you.

But I aint that lucky. Or at least, I wasn't.

stringent

2007-06-05T12:43:00.001-05:00

9:27 am

It's hard. You've really got to be clinical in the way you choose to administer the discipline. Now that makes a lot of sense. I want to come in here and start writing right away, just to sort out my thoughts. It only took about 7 years to figure out that the Internet is for shit, just like TV. Except at least it can be read. No, see. It's just another tool. Like the man said, it's in the way that you use it.

It seems like there must be a perfect series of moves, that if I could just make the right ones, unerring, no false steps, maybe I could get to where I want to be. You have to be stringent in your administration of discipline. Maybe that's why I'm here. Maybe it's that I need to learn that lesson, learn it and hold it once and for all, before I'm able to advance.

un poco triste

2007-06-01T15:09:00.001-05:00

Today I feel a burden
of regret over
past apathy.

A gnawing awareness
of every day
I've wasted.

We live in dark times.
We crave absolution.
We craft dark rhymes.

The Devil will account
for every malefactor,
great and small.

The best
you can do
is whatever

you can do
to keep a sense
of hope alive.

We live in dark times.
We crave absolution.
We craft dark rhymes.

galaxies galore

2007-05-31T15:19:00.001-05:00

11:19 am

what a morning, a tremendous morning, a tremendous tremendous morning

I don't want to explain it all at all, I don't want to jinx it. But of course there is no jinxing, just like there is no spoon harhar. Having to come into Work is kind of jinxy but not really the key is to stay grounded and realize that everything is indeed arranged just so and you just go with that

But remember you're just writing this in Word it's not like it absolutely must go up on the fucking blog, so write whatever, and that of course is another key. The other key is

(I have it all mapped out in my mind)

You know, in the last analysis you end up defining for yourself what it will be to "make it" and for me all it's going to involve at this point is my little analog tape recorder from Radio Shack, the old fashioned kind, notebooks and pens, my beat up old laptop used exclusively for Word, my Yamaha 12-string and my good old grey '87 Strat.

The thing about Strats is they get better with age, they really do, they really really do.

(Guitar. What a word. My favorite word. Aw yeah, babe.)

If I can write 'em all as fast as I wrote the one I wrote this morning they are going to pile up fast buddy and the riff for this one is really something that just came from a chord progression I was playing purely to practice switching clean and crisp from barre chords to open chords letting every note ring pure how lame is that but there it was. Then I came up with a line that the cyborg would speak and took it from there. Aw yeah babe.

Not going to divulge lyrics here. That was the great mistake of Maught Braughmby, in a certain sense. Wasting those kinda bullets in blogland is a big no-no. Blogs are for stupid self-referential bullshit. Never forget that.

So, roughed out probably around 15 verses. And just go from there. It's the Beizart thing but I'm a re-tool it all as I go. Making it up as I go. If I think too much about this I'll begin to have a(nother) nervous fucking breakdown. So: a little each day.

(Yeah, buddy. These are the Lessons. Put one foot in front of the other. And soon you'll be walkin' out the door. Aw yeah babe)

So anyway I came up with the riff and recorded it and then sang it, and I can't lie, it is pretty good.

Actually, it is the fucking Deal, baby.

But. The key being, you gotta keep going. Like the man said, way back in the day at some student art exhibition, The real shame of it is that he didn't make 50 more of 'em, just like this.

**

But golly, I could get a lot more done if I didn't drink at night while doing it. Stick to beer and sip slow, I guess. I start drinking that fucking Pinot and next thing I know I've just drunk a whole big bottle. Except: I won't lie, last night I really meant to, I really just felt like getting fucking ripped.

Great, great.

And so on another note: I finally figured out that memorizing the lyrics to the ole cover songs while driving in the truck is the way to take it. Because not knowing the words is a Major Problem. Because the other thing is, you really do, you really really do at some level have to be The Human Jukebox. As long, of course, that you're playing songs that you like. Because otherwise, as the sage must know, it aint really workin'.

And there are a veritable houseload of good cheesy songs out there for to play in bars and such, a veritable houseload. Because, at long last, playing out as much as much as is possible (an admitted known unknown) for $ is the next step, purely because I would like to be makin' more money for to buy more instruments, a good digital recorder, a killer amp, etc. See, and talking like this is what makes me nervous; it veers toward the territory of Wanting The Wrong Things. The key of course being to do what you can do, to do it Now, and to eschew trying to rig your shit up with preconceptions, preconceived notions: a strange turn of phrase, that, but there it is.

And I think you know what I mean.

But, nonetheless, I'll be damned if I don't do this thing. One or two fucking gigs is all I'm talking about. I've got a few local places in mind. Have to hit their open mikes first, and will have to, you know, kill. Which is not necessarily easier said than done; thing is, you can't be terminally under-rehearsed, as I often was, back when I was Being Stupid. As I may have mentioned.

Anyway, I aint gonna lie and say I'm not kinda skeered and uncertain as to how exactly it's all going to go. This shit sure aint getting done all by itself is all I know. 'Cause you know, you've first got to apprehend the songs and acquire a certain foundation of technique, and rightexactlynow I haven't quite done either, and I can't quite say how long it's going take before I'm really truly ready. After all, I've only been back in zee black for about a month here, got to remember that, got to keep remembering that. I'm still way deep in the Woodshed here, but it's getting more interesting by the day. A lot more interesting. As the strengths build and the skills coalesce, it gets more interesting. By exercising it every day you exude your own metaphysical paraffin, sweating it out like lamp oil, which you then burn; endeavor to coruscate, in some small measure, and then you go back and fucking burn it some more until it won't stop glowing

Aw yeah babe. That is exactly what you do

Er, yeah.

Got to get back on task here but at least I got this mental and emotional party train back rolling and, like the ballplayers say, untracked, now

Also this morning, after roughing out the cyborg's (first) song, I realized that the problem with one of the other ones (Stump Sprouts, if you must know) was that I've been playing it way way way too slow. Crash along with it fast and with a muted sense of smoldering mingled with the regret and voila there it is. Or at least, there the shape of it is.

The neighbors must think I'm a fuckin' flake, and good God, what if I am. A man lives in a house for nearly 5 years and then one day Boom all he's ever doing is playing acoustic and electric guitars, playing harmonica, singing. Carrying on like a fuckin' Teen Ager. But you see, that's the key: to attack it every day like you did when you was aged, say, thirteen fourteen fifteen and sixteen, except, and here's the catch: Knowing What You Know Now.

(And there you have it, friends and neighbors, The Secret To Being A Real Artist. Tell 'em you heard it here over it File 313; but then, if you're one of the three out there who might be reading this, you prob'ly don't need me to tell you. Bat, for sure, I know you don't.

And so much for all that; that's the gyp and the paradox and the irony of it all…why, it's a gyparadoxirony…harhar, I got a million of em folks a million of 'em I tell ya a million)

Whatever, at least I'm singing kinda low, not caterwauling like some emotional wreck like back in the old days, oh no.

(Also not screaming and howling no more at walls and worse in a rage of brutal self-abnegation and lost lonesome despair. Which I have done my fair share of over the past, oh, 5 – 6 years, because I'd Quit Playing, all because I'd been Wanting The Wrong Things. And Hadn't Figured That Out. But then we've already covered that particular angle. No sense going backward too too much here. Oh no no no)

(Yet, my only hope for any of these boring ridiculouso rants is that they're somehow therapeutic in a way that's Necessary For Me…good grief…)

Or maybe the neighbors can't really hear and don't care. I will and do shut the windows when I think it's getting too ridiculous.

But hear this: a man should sing low and cool; that's just the way it has to be; the faster you learn that, the faster you'll obtain, sonnyboy, the faster you'll obtain, the faster you'll obtain.

Er, yeaaaaaaaaah. Say, it's feelin kinda jinxy in here, Maughx; you're really giving all all all away here, aintchee, a bit too much in the telling. But then, fuck it, you know I don't stop, I don't want to stop, I just wanna keep on going

And you are not helping the cause nor the plan one bit by going on and on and on here while other more mundane yet nevertheless vital and workmanlike tasks awaitchee.

Do your chores first, then you can play.

It is ever the story.

3:34 pm

Woah I really hesitate to post all this crap because I feel it is LAME at a very fundamental level. But will post in the interest of moving right along and why the F not. It's blogland, baby, so show the folks yer ass with aplomb; it'll all be gone by Sunday anyway.

Let it be a lesson to me not to be such a tool.

I know some people like to disparage that myspace music but I think at a certain level it's pretty decent as a way at least to hear what everyone doing. Big news flash, I know.

It's been opening up my horizons at least.

Galaxies and galaxies, baby, galaxies and galaxies and galaxies galore.

discipline

2007-05-30T14:03:00.000-05:00

10:00 am

Unstinting in each now. Is how you’ve got to be.

Sitting here in cube, ugh. But. I am going to get my mundane shit done now.

Fuck that Internet. I tire of it. The sage is strategic in his use of it. And I have a plan.

And if I can implement that plan, I will have a stack of lyrics by the time that I’m really ready to bring ‘em out.

(shed that cladding, the useless past. or is it the opposite)

(whispering sense of embedded meta-doom)

But here’s this, though: it’s a hell of a lot easier to write, period, kid, a hell of a lot easier, now that I’m not charging myself with being That Kind Of Writer.

I mean, sweet Jesus, the idea of writing novels, and not just novels, but in the end, novels in verse, about mythical failed guitar players. Yeah, that sounds like a lot of fun.

Writing about making music is a lot like writing about having sex. Boring!

So then: I’m gonna try to avoid getting into the particulars of daily practice, because I think it detracts from what I’m about. But what I can tell you is that I’m focused on technique, real technique, now, in a way that I wasn’t before and haven’t been heretofore. And part of that sure is coming from being confined to practicing acoustic on a 12-string, because that instrument is in a lot of ways twice as demanding. And that cheap Yamaha sounds better than you might think.

But then, that’s the way it is with guitars and guitar playing. Requiring a subtle kind of precision and an almost effortless kind of strength, you want to be deft fluid firm precise

Er, right.

Yeah. So that’s why I’m going to have to go back to GC one of these days and check that $200 six-string Yamaha. Because I think there might’ve been something to that cheap mother.

And it’s good thing I haven’t bought another expensive guitar yet anyway because I’m not sure at this point what exactly it is that I’m going to be wanting. There’s a vintage music store out in the western part of the state that, for instance, has a 12-string Guild that is The Deal, and you know, something like that might really end up being the thing for me. Because, shit, 12-strings are the deal but they are a lot harder to play well; but then, that’s what I’m presently about through a kind of chance and happenstance.

Uh, right.

But see, getting your wire and wood skills together after a long long layoff - not to say a nearly terminal layoff - well, getting it all back and then some via the exclusive acoustic use of the 12-string is one the best things a motherfucker can do. Because you’ve got to be stronger, better, faster, more precise. And then, when you take that back to playing, say, your Stratocaster (which I do), then you see just how much farther along you’re getting in terms of being A Monster On The Electric. Because, let’s face it, Rock Music, baby. You know, that element. Hardcore troubadour and all like that. That is The Deal.

(a certain mad scientist ethic, believin in things only I can see)

Because at this point, for me, not being All The Guitarist I Can Be is definitely not gonna cut it. And that idea quickly leads one into this head of, committing to a lifeling pursuit of the mastery of the guitartial arts, sort of thing. Which you clearly need anyway, no matter what happens, because there’s a hell of a lot of good guitar players out there, a hell of a lot of them, who will always be better than you. A lot better.

(This is all foolish bullshit, Maught Procrastination.

Stream of consciousness is all the media feed I need. Seriously, fuck surfing the Internet. A Caucasoid gotta be strategic in his use of it.)

OK, fuck it, get to work.

3:02 pm

Discipline.

With any, I could eventually score that whole stupid fucking Jacob Beizart thing, all of it. The fucking robot, the fucking humanoid, all of it. Complete with ambient noise and guitar solos. All of it.

And I just may.

ahem

2007-05-29T15:51:00.000-05:00

9:55 am

Oh, did I ever have a post last week, I was out in a biggish city by a big big lake, but then my laptop shit the bed, all corrupted, but oh, did I have a post. I'd even posted it, then I panicked that I'd written something to incriminate myself and, well, I hadda go back in there and delete that shit, because I can't have that. Not that I'd written anything all that incriminating, but still. But I tell you, it was a grand post, written with a head aflame, in airports and hotel rooms, oh the things I wrote. Alright, it wasn't that great. Kinda great. Might try to recapture a few vignettes. Later. When I'm not At Work. Got to get my Adult Crap done so's I can Play Later. Yeah. You should see the calluses on my lefthand fingers. Really ugly. But remember: right hand technique is what gets you there. Really, you gotta have both. I might yet buy that $199 Yamaha if it seems that there's songs inside it. Oh, it's been a crash course right back into the fray of it all. Getting my shit back together again. Hear my train a 'comin. A certain "mad scientist" ethic. Believin in things only I can see. Got to do it though and really sorta didn't today. Fuck, I hate it when work derails the plan and this week work is derailing the plan.

1:49 pm

Stream of consciousness is

all the media feed I need

The Internet, I hate it,

it's makin me stupider