pelirojoguitar

I woke up today to a very tough decision: Picking a song that has meaning in my life. First, understand there isn’t a dearth of songs for me to choose. That is exactly why the choice is so hard, coupled with the fact that a blank page is the bane of the writer. Pink Floyd’s “Fearless” rung in my head, along with The Velvet Underground’s “Heroin”. I listened to an alternate version of Willie Nelson’s “Funny How Time Slips Away”, and Neil Young’s “Harvest Moon” (often confused with the album, Harvest). The answer came to me in the place where all the world’s great minds have always found inspiration: frying eggs for breakfast. That answer was “Race For The Prize” by The Flaming Lips.

My history with The Flaming Lips is on the shorter end of the spectrum, and isn’t one of total respect. I admire their wackiness because if they are anything, it is unique. At the same time, they are a little too avant garde for me at times (see their remake of Dark Side of the Moon). Despite all of this background, they have made a few songs that have really touched me. Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots is on my classic album list with the crown jewel being “Do You Realize”. This essay isn’t about my opinion of The Flaming Lips or their discography or anything but “Race For The Prize”. So Here Goes.

Describing songs is always a hard thing to do, at least for me. It is like describing color or emotion. This is subjective stuff, and it takes a adroit paper to objectify it. The song opens up with pounding drums and an absolutely soaring synth. If I had to give the song an emotion, I would call it hope with a melocholly heart. It earns the title of hope for the lyrics “Two scientists were racing / For the good of all mankind / Both of them side by side / So Determined / Locked in heated battle”. These two scientists are working for the cure, running against one another. One is bound to lose, if not both. “Theirs is to win / If it kills them / They’re just humans / With wives and children” That may be the most beautiful chorus I have ever heard. It isn’t bright, but it is trying to make a hopeless situation hopeful. It is also a slower, softer contrast to the blaring synth and drums before it.

If you have ever had an existential crisis, this song will touch you.

I kn\ow I have. There is no emptiness like sitting in a class room and suddenly feeling that he world has no meaning,

and there is no awe like asking yourself why anything is. So I understand the plight of the scientists. They want to mean something. They give themselves a reason. But they are just human. I am just human, and that is the most beautiful and most terrifying thing about life. I can’t help but wonder if at the end of this race for the prize,  will there be a prize? the final chorus changes from “theirs is to win / if it kills them” to “theirs is to win / it will kill them”.

This is a thin first draft for a school paper. Feel free to give me comments. I will be expanding on this.

-Turtle

What difference would it make
If tomorrow I awoke a turtle

All my hope, dreams, fears
Traded for scales, a shell, a beak

Would I cry turtle tears,
Or laugh a turle laugh?

And which would touch me more:

Knowing that which I had lost

Or

Knowing that which hadnt changed

As of right now, I am stuck in Whitehall, MI. It is a small town in western Michigan, hugging both white lake and lake Michigan. Up here, one has to do many different things to occupy himself because the small town life doesn’t provide many opportunities to o so. My little brother and I are sitting in the back of the local coffee shop mulling over ideas for our new animated TV show, “Potentially Crabapple”.

The idea for our main character, Crabapple, is the culmination of maybe twenty minutes of thought between my brother and I. The idea originally sprung from King Tuff (one of my favorite bands right now) and their occult referencing song “Sun Medallion”. The other day I was singing and playing it, and my brother joked that I should play dirty grunge songs at kids birthday parties. From their our main character, potentially named Crabapple, was born.

He is a dirty, hunch backed antique store owner who is or isn’t human. He is versed in witchcraft and sells magical antiques. he has long, pale bony fingers covered in jewels and tattoos. He always wears sunglasses, a stained top hat, coattails and the likes. Think Slash meets the classic Scooby Doo vibe. Everything is dirty and creepy. Voice wise, I’m thinking gravely smokers voice. My brother is fascinated with this show being disturbing, and wants crabapple to have a penchant for dirty carrion birds.

Of course, no animated TV show can be complete with one character. Crabapple may be a witchman, but he is physically a puss puss and needs someone to do his heavy lifting. Im obviously reaching into already used tropes here, but Crabapple is going to have a lackey named Boom Boom. Boom Boom is of Arabic origin, wears a fez and genie garb ( I don’t  know the names for any Genie wear). He isnt very bright and is kind of cliche but this show is never going to actually happen so who cares.

Other characters include a recurring typical suppressed suburban family that is always fucked over by Crabapples antics. We potentially have a marine boot camp father, 1950’s blond mother, and two children. If we really wanted to tie this family into the show, one of the children could be a little sweet looking girl who hangs with Crabapple and is really evil.

Potential episodes are abound. Crabapple is low on funds so he whips out an enchanted guitar and plays at children’s birthday parties (a perfect place for me to write in some music). Crabapple needs to clean his store and we just get to see all the weird shit he has inside. Fez’s family comes to visit, the army father tries to get Crabapple thrown in jail, etc. Honestly, the settings are more of a starting point than a necessity. This show has some potential in my mind to be really punk, and thats what I would like. punk. Punk. PUNK.

To bad this show will NEVER happen. Ever.

So that writers workshop book game me a prompt: “Listen to an album you’ve never heard and know nothing about, and review it”.

That EP is happiness by Elle Mary and The Bad Men out of Manchester, UK. I’m not really going to go into detail about how I found this group, because frankly no one cares about my little musings. Things happened, sprinkle in a bit of luck, and here we are.  Elle Mary and The Bad Men (from now on EM + BM) characterize themselves as “drawn to the community and kinship of folk but willing to push its stylistic boundaries”. I’m paraphrasing right there. Sorry if I sounded like a douche.

Most reviews about albums and EPs start out with the first song and follow through to the last. I have decided that I am going to start with the last song on the EP, and then go in whatever damn order I please. That track is titled “Monster”. In a nutshell, this is the sound the whole EP was going for, but it was the only song that really nailed it. The song is a slow burn with Elle’s vocals actually haunting you. At times she goes for the high notes but she really shines when shes hits the low lyrics “he lives in my chest, feeds on my tears”. I felt like she has moved past depression to a sort of emptiness and bleakness that is much more moving than tears. The Bad Men are tight, but they aren’t doing much work anyway. Still, props to them.

Next song on the list: “Happiness” (the second of five songs on the EP). The EP is entitled happiness, so I guess this song is supposed to be the cream of the crop. And it is good. It just isn’t the best song here. like the other five songs, “Happiness” is a slow jam with Elle’s vocals being the obvious center piece. The song is manic-depressive; every now and then EM + BM seems to burst with happiness before returning to the melancholy jam. Lyrically, I wasn’t paying attention. Good stuff Elle, we love ya.

the 4th track on the EP is rose. When I first read it, I thought EM + BM were referring to the flower. Instead, the meant rose as in the past tense of rise. That is semantics for you. As you may have guessed, the vibe of this song starts slow (again…) but rises as the title suggests. You guessed right. this song is worth it for the crescendo of sound at about 2:25. the musical tension that was being built (whether or not you consciously noticed it) finally gives way into a resolution. That musical resolution serves well to break this song up, but is short lived as the song returns to the previous ‘build-up” right after.

The third track on the EP is “husband”. I re-listened to this song right before writing this paragraph, and on a whim decided to listen to the lyrics. As a music reviewer, you would think that is something I would do; you would be wrong. However, when you have a band that calls themselves folk, and the musical centerpiece is a voice rather than a guitar, you have to listen to those lyrics. “Sister, you made it easy for me to take your man”. After hearing that, I found myself looking at sweet, home-wrecking Elle in a whole new light. “Its kind of sad, you wont let him leave, its what he tells me, you won’t let him leave”. This song is the most jarring and inharmonious of the bunch, but I don’t say that in a bad way. The guitarist (shoutout to The Bad Men) decided to let hims fingers drag over the strings, creating a low screech that most guitarist’s try to avoid. Maybe I’m over-analyzing here, but the topic of stealing your sisters husband is jarring in its own right so it fits to have some screechy guitar.

Finally for the first track, “Falling”. I really like Elle’s vocals in this song as well. They are a less shining “Monster in my eyes.” Ok, I’m too tired to keep this going.

Maybe one day, I will return to this review and give it the justice it deserves. And maybe one day, I wont.

http://ellemarymusic.bandcamp.com/album/happiness-ep

Why am I doing this? I have never been particularly attracted to the idea of being a writer. In the seventh grade, I wrote about twenty pages of a story about a south Texas border town. Twenty pages, and I dropped that thing. Haven’t written since. So, again, why am I doing this?

Maybe I am doing this because subconsciously I want to write; It feels good to let these thoughts I didn’t even know I had flow out of me. Hopefully I will wake up tomorrow and have some meta-physical baggage lifted from my person. Though ,or some reason I can’t quite put my finger on, I doubt that will happen.

Ok, so I am not doing this because I subconsciously want to write (?). I am taking a course in college next semester about music and for summer work I have to read a collection/writers workshop chalk full of music reviews. I guess that is cool, because i am trying so desperately to start a band right. So desperately , in fact, that this whole post is about to be derailed by my need to talk about this band. Focus. Focus. This book I’m reading (called How To Write About Music for those of you who care to know) has plenty of prompts and works to go by, so I guess here I am.

Alright, I guess I can talk about my to-this-point fictional band and my musical history. I started playing the guitar in the sixth grade after hearing AC/DC. I don’t know how I could go from ages zero to twelve without listening to music, but I did. AC/DC gave me a little sixth grade jolt, and Angus Young was the shit. My grandpa bought me a little crap fender strat and amp, and I was grooving. I play those pentatonic scales to Jimi Hendrix jams and it was good. (This is kind of draining, im going to kick it up here). I just have always wanted the band is the gist, have tried to make it work a couple of times to no avail. For the first time I am writing lyrics.

no, I wont write them on this blog post. They are kind of shallow and only work when I sing them to the song.

When I return to the ATX, I will be playing with a dope drummer and a dope guitarist. i just hope we all have the fire ( I know I do) to get some legit songs going and maybe just maybe play at a fucking gig.

TOMORROW I WILL DO ONE OF THESE WRITING PROMPTS, YOU BETTER BELIEVE ME RIGHT NAH.