"Howland Owl: 'The future looks the same in both directions.'
Churchy
LaFemme: 'Dull, ain't it?'"
Walt Kelly - Pockets Full of Pie: The Complete Syndicated Comic Strips Volume 7
Texts
From Recent Arrivals
July 1, 2022
Endorphin - Gerry Hemingway Quintet [from Outerbridge Crossing]
selected conversations
with scribble bass
a circus
play on
multiple stages at once
Quintet for Woodwinds - Johanna Beyer - Arizona Wind Quintet
rocking in a small boat
attention arrested
back in the boat
Dialogue II - Kate Soper, Sam Pluta [from The Understanding of All Things]
comes on like Berio's Visage
but on a narrower bandwidth
stays put on its first focused sound and affects group
our
attention is inside the vocalist's head
creatures come out of their
mouth
Improvisation #2 - Taylor Ho Bynum, Mark Dresser [from THB Bootlegs Volume 4]
we roll up the inclines
we hang around at the top
we roll down
disinclined to accelerate
lazy gravity day
Recorded
I Never Loved a Man (The Way I Love You) - Aretha Franklin [from I Never Loved a Man the Way I Love You]
toxic relation devotion
embedded within a gospel blues infused sound
Roll on Columbia - Country Joe McDonald [from The Greatest Songs of Woody Guthrie]
boosterism always gives history a whitewash
the singer has elided the
verses that celebrate our genocide and inundation of indigenous people's
fishing spots
The London Boys - David Bowie [from Starting Point]
I like the electric organ sound
a close second person narrative of an
initiation ritual
Rapid Eye Movement (R.E.M.) - Walt Wagner [from The Evening Muse]
a bit happy happy
but the keyboard playing is clever and clear
Assembly Rechoired 21 - Karen Eisenbrey, Keith Eisenbrey, Marilyn Meyer [April 11, 1987]
we are at the Valley Café in Ellensburg
where we met Marilyn for lunch.
It was about halfway between us.
We made this tape with the new
Walkman Professional cassette tape device.
My recollection is that it
came with a microphone about the size of a lapel pin.
and a blackberry banana smoothie
all this confusion on tape
family
business
the Anarchy Kleenex box episode
was on the night before
when we got back from the Mariners game
we are the lapel mic in the past
a fly on a long ago wall
conversation artifacts are more tightly bound to our inner biographic
time-lines
than music artifacts mostly are
some strange music in the restaurant
the Moose Lodge in Sunnyside
it is very good bread
work gossip from Northern Life
computer widow
changed the sentence
so I could use what I
said
Study 51 "3750" - Conlon Nancarrow [from Conlon Nancarrow Lost Works, Last Works]
benefits of Nancarrow's procedure
an incomplete list
he gets to use some interesting sounding pianos
I believe that every key
strike is as equal as the technology allowed
Breakdown - Mariah Carey [from Butterfly]
streams of words and vocalese
generally ignorable as text
builds layers of vocal lines
part of what makes this relatively straightforward to manufacture
however creative that process is
is the predictability of the
machined beat
always the same tempo
exactly
for maximum
productivity of the listening consumer
Tell Me No - Whitney Houston [from Just Whitney]
someone's analyzing their relationship from an esteem stance
I do wish
the mix weren't so compressed
shred to the end
what most interests me today on this project
is how radically the
chopping up
affects the sense of what's going on
even though
significant aspects of the original signal
remain intact
and in
order
Sound Check - Andrew James Robison [recorded live at Rat and Raven, Seattle, August 9, 2012]
it was a quick sound check
so mostly it's about a minute of conversation
in a now defunct bar
Distracted Driver - Your Mother Should Know [recorded live at Sunset Tavern, Seattle, April 28, 2017]
two verses vocals
one verse guitar
solo
last verse vocal
repeat to fade
Man That I Am - Star Anna [from Live at Rimbert Illustration]
confession from a hard life
The Hunting Galliard, Fvb 132 - Thomas Tomkins - Claudio Columbo [from The Fitzwilliam Virginal Book]
modern truisms
about how many iterations of anything might be proper
or in good form
do not apply to this
calling into question
any universal application they might have
Sonata in F minor, Kk. 187 - Domenico Scarlatti - Pieter-Jan Belder
truism fully activated
but as an instrument of liveliness
he plays
on its edge
String Quartet in A Major, Op. 20 #6 - Franz Joseph Haydn - The Kodály- Quartet
in a complex world
straight lines can help to orient one's path
all attend upon the tune
reflecting it
to its singular
advantage
interlocking cooperations
Sonata in E minor, Op. 143 - Carl Czerny - Martin Jones
a theme presented
is a scene set
action!
music is drama
characters are always instantly recognizable
resolutely on the straight and narrow
any disturbing sidepaths are
avoided
everybody is wholesome
even the stormy movement makes
everything all better
now
at nearly every moment
no
Schubertian abysses open before us
of any suddens
winter is long
and we begin in the darkest of it
our place is not
certain
Fantasy and Fuge on Ad Nos, Ad Sultarem Undam (Liszt) - Ferrucio Busoni - Wolf Harden
the material introduced with interlinear eruptions
elaborated passion
the Lisztian suspension of time on full display
certainly has
fistfuls of notes
at as many moments as possible
but it's always
clear where we are
or into just what exact turmoil we have fallen
East St. Louis Toodle-Oo - Duke Ellington [from The Ken Burns Jazz Collection]
first segment
narrow intervals
second segment
opens up
then edges back
subsequent segments
are variations on these
two
ending on the narrow
She'll Be Comin' Round the Mountain - Pickard Family [from Evans 78s]
who is she anyway
to be worthy of such celebration
Swing, Brother, Swing (Live) - Billie Holiday [from Lady Day, The Complete Billie Holiday on Columbia]
within a club culture
music advertises itself
like neon beer signs
behind the bar
4, 5, and 9 - Lead Belly [from Where Did You Sleep Last Night, Lead Belly Legacy Volume 1]
delivering a message
from a boogie woogie choo choo
All of You - Miles Davis [from 'Round About Midnight]
new soloist
and the drummer amends his approach
the bass and keys
probably do too
a modulation
of feel
when the piano starts to solo
the drummer adds some rimshots to the mix
trumpet returns
and its back to the brushes
Talkin 'Bout You - The Beatles [from First Live Recordings Volume 2]
being the young tough
Try Me Little Girl - Bob Dylan [from A Tree With Roots]
exploring the dark underbelly of North American song
tight space
sheer face
respite = 0
wind > 11
How long does it take to punch a roll? (from Conlan Nancarrow speaks with Charles Amirkhanian) - [from Conlon Nancarrow Lost Works, Last Works]
lots of notes
six to eight months
Love and My Best Friend - Janet Jackson [from Janet Jackson]
teen sheen
holy reverb
a few words on a loop
goes around
with the world
then a bunch of words
such a relief
to get
back to the loop
trapped
in the scrubbed up past
like a
#mood
Tougher Than The Rest - Bruce Springsteen [from Tunnel of Love]
romance brag
to immediately address a stranger
with a familiar
term of endearment
even as generic
as honey
or babe
is
infantilizing
no?
Spam Again (Live) - Moe Tucker [from I Feel So Far Away, Moe Tucker Anthology 1974 - 1998]
life in wage America
Playa Hater - The Notorious B.I.G. [from Life After Death]
a conglomeration of curated parts
Intermezzo, Op. 117 #1 - Johannes Brahms [from The Romance of Music Chamber Concert, April 14, 2002]
at a community orchestra concert in Sedro-Woolley
I don't remember who
the pianist was
and the recording was not labeled
but they did fine
perhaps a bit polite
Finding Adam - Antique Scream [from Sing the Sun]
visceral center of testostero-masculine display
no soft spots in this
here ManMan
with respect to George - Benjamin Boretz - Keith Eisenbrey [recorded November 21, 2012]
goes
then stays
observes
walks around to another side
lingers
lingers on
Arrival of the Bee Box - Greg Sinibaldi - Greg Sinibaldi, Ryan Ferriera, Ted Poor [from Ariel]
waves
slow buffets
re-inundations
heavy weight
melodic
movement
heave
with strong drums
angry snarls
recorded in a room
enough of the trace of that room
upon the
sounds made in that room
allow
a reconstruction
of a room
around the sound
as it speaks
into this room
metal on metal scrape tunes
speed and pressure and friction
The Quadran Pavan and Galliarde to the Quadran Pavan, Fvb 133 & 134 - William Byrd - Claudio Columbo [from The Fitzwilliam Virginal Book]
ascending by patterns of steps taken
on multiple rotation staircases
a synthesis desynthesizes
along new lines of multifurcation
when a line is played
along a particular alignment of meter
and then upon an other such alignment
does the line transform
the alignment
or does the alignment
transform the line
or both
or neither?
is there a metameter
to the
displacement feels
of the newly aligned lines?
We Are Journeying On - Price Family Sacred Singers [from Allen Lowe's Turn Me Loose White Man]
just articulate it like the guitar plucks it
what could be simpler
he doesn't just talk to his guitar
he talks to the high register
of both the guitar
and his falsetto ooooo
behind it all
one surmises a simpler tune
that he is perpetually sliding off of
recoiling
Chasin' the Bird - Charlie Parker [from The Complete Savoy and Dial Master Takes]
a jolly time
inventing a new way to move in music
Come Back - Ray Charles [from Ray Charles]
how easily the language fits the tune
a demonstration
that English
is a tonally inflected language
at
perhaps
some level
not quite systematically lexical
Go To Hell - Nina Simone [from Silk & Soul]
it takes at least eight notes in sequence
to sing the word "hell"
move it up a step
for emphasis
The Captain Calls For You - Little Richard [from The King of the Gospel Singers]
the media is the message
so what's left of the Gospel?
the commercialization and glitzification of church music
does the church
no favors
in my ever so humble opinion
Au - John Lennon & Yoko Ono [from Live Jam]
cheers over feedback
Yoko vocalizes into an amplification system
in regard to the avant-adjacent stuff
that John Lennon occasionally
indulged in
from him
it comes across as a throwaway
costing
nothing
no stakes
Song of Songs - The Iron Men (Anthony Braxton, Woody Shaw) [from The Iron Men]
when the overture is over
and the song rhythm picks up
beats two
and three lean forward
later
many do
grid space at a cant
In Session at The Tintinabulary
June 29, 2022
Lonely, from Minute Etudes Book 1 - Emily Doolittle
Prelude in C-sharp minor - Keith Eisenbrey
July 1, 2022
Anybody's Fingerbook 7x7 (transpositional) B C D - Keith Eisenbrey
Postscripts
Skaldmud's Doodle Gallery
some listening journal doodles from 1986
