Do You Think It’s Gonna Rain?

Seems to me that most of the problems in the human world come down to a refusal to sit down and talk together.

Well I’m ninety four percent emotional 
Six percent logical 
And I’d like to get to know you
But I see difficulties ahead.
Because you only speak binary
Which might as well be martian to me
You see my brain is made of water mainly
And on a dry, hot, sunny day like this

In a desert 
A long way from anywhere
I’m a washed up sinner
With a dried out skin
And I don’t think 
No I don’t think
I’ll get to know you
Anytime soon

Well your fifty eight percent culpable 
I’m forty two percent alcohol
And we’re not really capable
Of very much, I suspect
But at this moment in history
There’s only you, and only me
And we have to talk
Yes we have to talk
Or we’re all gonna die

In this desert
A long way from anywhere
I’m a washed up sinner
With a dried out skin
And I don’t think 
No I don’t think
I’ll get to know you
Anytime soon

Because the numbers don’t stack up
It’s a shame
We’re gonna mess it up
What a shame
But at least we’re talking now
What’s your name?

And do you think it’s gonna
Do you think it’s gonna 
Do you think it’s gonna rain?    

In this desert 
A long way from anywhere
We are washed up sinners
With dried out skin
And I don’t think 
No I don’t think

Do you think it’s gonna rain?   
Do you think it’s gonna rain?   
Do you think it’s gonna rain?   
Do you think it’s gonna rain?   

Forgotten, But Never Forgotten

I have a pile of songs in waiting. They sit there in a little green room, hoping that one day I’ll record them during my regular Thursday morning recording sessions for my once a month releases.

”Pick me. Pick me”.

If a song is still around and hasn’t been lost in the fog of time, then it stands a chance. But because I write more songs than I record, some of them do get buried under the pile, their little songy arms and legs occasionally sticking out and nudging my memory like a once loved toy.

These days I’ve stopped trying to second guess what songs other people will like, and simply write and record for my own entertainment.

I still carry a flame for all of those songs though, whether they make it onto my own personal hit list or not. I wish they all could.

Nobody wants to break a songs heart, do they?

Wafflers Anonymous

There are times when ya brain feels like it’s connected to the words that come out of your mouth. Or from your pen, or keypad.

And there are times when it doesn’t.

Waffling, in general conversation, when time isn’t an issue, when you’re relaxed and among friends, doesn’t really matter much. It can be part of the fun.

But when you’re trying to communicate something…in a song, a story a blog…to any kind of audience that is tuning in to hear you, or hopes you might have something interesting to say…then it does tend to matter. Unless, perhaps, when the waffling is part of the schtick.

At times when it does matter, it’s frustrating when you can’t manage to be relaxed and coherent. I have often been a waffler, partly connected to a form of social anxiety I have suffered in certain situations.

But, the good news for me, and people like me, is that clear communication, like any skill, can be practised and improved upon.

But you know, it sort…i’m…like, time…it can take a…it tends to be a work in…not quite there yet.

The Bright Lights

A Lumen is a measure of the total amount of visible light to the human eye from a lamp or light source

For instance, if you look into a 100 watt lightbulb you are being subjected to about 1600 lumens. That feels very bright because the light is close by.

But all light isn’t equal.

If you look in a general easterly direction on a cloudy day in winter, you will be experiencing far more lumens than even the brightest indoor lights can provide.

Which is partly why outdoor light (or even the light coming through a window) is far better for our mental health and for resetting the circadian rhythms that help us get better sleep, than our artificial lights.

The bright lights, aren’t always the right light.

Waiting For Bob

A sense of the ridiculous.

One of the lesser known senses, but perhaps the biggest lifesaver.

It leads to cool, refreshing, POINTLESS laughter. The best kind. The kind that cleans out the insides. That tickles away the heavy, leaden clutter which attaches itself so persistently to the old grey matter.

It lets you know that whatever seems to matter up there, doesn’t really.

Leaving you free to do whatever it is that doesn’t really matter, with a purer heart.

Decisioning

I’m one of the performers (along with Norman Lamont and MJ Tiemstra) on this Wednesday’s HomeSongs4Life, and now I’m stuck with the same dilemma that everybody else faces.

It’s only two songs. So which two songs do I play?

”Play one you know!” I hear a heckler shout out.

Yep, nice. That is a good starting point, to be fair.

But there are so many choices. And though having options is such a privilege, “choosing” always seem to be the hardest word.

Having said that, waiting till Wednesday to decide is never the answer. At least not for me. It just stretches out the, ahem, suffering. So I’m gonna wrestle this one to the ground this very morning.

Oh yeah! Bring that decisioning fight on!

You can find out how I did on Wednesday.

Moon River

Just a lovely, lovely song for a Sunday morning. Moon River says all that needs to be said in a few perfectly sculpted lines. With a glorious, sunset melody that you watch, silently, as it drops slowly below the horizon.

But the glow remains.

Moon river, wider than a mile
I'm crossing you in style some day
Oh, dream maker, you heart breaker
Wherever you're goin', I'm goin' your way

Two drifters, off to see the world
There's such a lot of world to see
We're after the same rainbow's end
Waitin' 'round the bend
My huckleberry friend
Moon river and me

Doing Our Thing

It was busy on the hill this Saturday morning. Well, by the hill’s usual Saturday morning standards anyway.

Sometimes it is. Mostly it isn’t. It’s not always an easy to thing to predict, and it’s not always the weather that is the main factor in the equation.

The whys and wherefores of levels of busy-ness might be possible to work out though. It might well be possible to discover why lots of people do one thing and not another. Watch one thing and not another. It might well be possible to discover why loads of people downloaded one song but not another. Attended one gig and not the next.

It might well be within our means to discover the essence of popularity itself.

And if we spend time doing that, it might well be in our best interest to change the way we do what we do, in order to fit in with the requirements. It could make our lives better.

That might all be needful and necessary. Sometimes it is.

But…if we enjoy and get pleasure from what we do, and perhaps bring that same joy and pleasure to a few other people, then it might well be worth not bothering with any of that, and just carry doing our thing.

Handy Habits

I woke a couple of times in the night and ended up thinking a while about a habit I’ve had for as long as I can remember. When I’m in bed, one hand or the other seems to need to be under my head, or between my knees. I sometimes wake up in the morning with pins and needles, or a numb hand, as a result.

As I lay there last night, I started picturing myself as a wee baby doing the same thing I find myself doing as a 56 year old man. Maybe I developed that habit in my mum’s womb, or in my early days on earth. It’s certainly very ingrained.

And it’s very hard to change ingrained habits. I’ve been playing the guitar for about 40 years, more so in the last two decades. I was self taught, and during that time I developed a lot of bad habits. Some of the things I’m trying to do to gain a better technique now are simply going to take an awful lot of time and repetition.

For me, this hard effort is worthwhile for some things, and maybe not for others. But the hope is that I contribute towards a better version of a future me.

Those decisions we make daily about where we allot the time we have control over is never an easy one. It’s the thing I struggle with more than anything, and it can cause me a certain amount of anxiety if I’m not careful.

But it’s always better to commit to a path, any path, with our music and our lives in general, rather than swimming in circles, or automatically continuing with habits that might not be proving to be the best for us.

Although, as I write, I’m still tempted to sit on my hands about all of that.

The Change Has Been Good

From a personal point of view, I’m really enjoying our new HomeSongs4Life format.

One artist has become three, and it’s feeling like a lot more fun for me. And from the feedback, the same applies to performers and audience too.

There is more interaction on the FB comments page now as well, although I’m still not paying any attention to, or worrying about, the numbers who turn up to watch live, or who catchup later. That always felt like the wrong thing to focus on.

The whole thing somehow feels more like a team effort. Which was always what I had hoped for. And it’s great to have artists that have been playing but not meeting, finally meeting each other. Albeit online.

The little bit of chat we have adds a lot to the experience I think. And the songs continue to be excellent. Moving and funny. Thoughtful and reflective. Human. Like the people who are singing them.

If you haven’t watched one yet, why not give it a shot.

The People In Charge

Taking responsibility for something other than ourselves and our own nappy change needs is a useful way to discover a bit more internal sympathy for The People In Charge.

Though, it’s true, some of them should never ever have been put in charge in the first place. If our systems and structures are causing people who are still in metaphorical nappies to be raised up to those positions, then something is very wrong.

Responsibility is best quietly taken. It shouldn’t be easily given.

And we should beware of people who grasp on to it and fight for it, like some kind of comfort blanket they can’t manage without.

Other Beverages Are Available

“I’d like to teach the world to sing, in perfect harmony”

The sentiment seems great, even if the story behind the sentiment isn’t. Though I don’t know how I’d feel about writing a tune that helped to make a sugary drink ubiquitous the world over. Songwriters have to make a living too, but …. well, we’ve all got to decide where we draw the line.

Though, I’m sure some of us are thinking “chance would be a fine thing”.

But even without the advertising back story, it’s easy to get cynical about the sentiment. If you’re going to have a dream though, “teaching the world to sing”, isn’t the worst.

It might be sugary, but at least it’s a healthy sugar.

And why do I suddenly fancy a coke?

Altogether Now…

Hippopottomonstrosesquipadaliaphobia is the word you’re looking for, when you want to describe “a fear of long words” in a snappy way.

Oh, the irony.

My foster son taught me this, and it appealed to his sense of humour as much as it does to mine. There is now, inevitably, a tune for the word and a song on the way.

It should be a great singalong.

ps. Songs can be about anything you damn well like. They don’t just have to be about Lurve. Not even on Valentine’s Day.

Credit Where Credit’s Due

So we made it!

We got this far.

Further than expected? Possibly.

Honestly, between you and me, I think we’re doing remarkably well.

Time for a piece of cake (even though it wasn’t always a piece of cake) and a pat on our respective backs.

Go us!

UnCouching The Potato

It’s dreich out there.

But out there is still often better than in here. We’re just back from an earliesh Saturday morning walk up the hill, and the drizzle and the lack of views didn’t spoil things a bit. The air was fresh, the birds still sang. Just a different kind of experience.

There’s a lot to be said for not letting the weather….or the circumstances….be the thing that keeps us sitting on our bums. Because, they are usually completely out of our control. And they might never be just perfectly aligned for whatever we have in mind.

Achieving Couch Potato status, for all it’s tempting and very cosy comforts, has never really been one of my longstanding ambitions.

I’m glad we got out.

Solomon Songs

Songs as a source of wisdom. Now there’s a thought.

In the collections of books we call the bible there is one called Song of Solomon.

That book was a written form of songs of wisdom that were sung and passed on to the Jewish people, possibly by King Solomon. He got his name on the book anyway.

Songs have probably been a way of passing on stories and ancestral history, sage wisdom and palatable life philosophy, as well as entertainment, throughout the ages. And the music wasn’t just for people of a particular age. It was for everyone.

I don’t know that we have that today. That is, we have the wisdom songs, I hear them often from performers on HomeSongs4Life, but we seem to have lost the habit of passing those songs down through the generations. There is undoubtedly a disconnect, in our western societies at least, between the music that the different generations listen to.

We’ve come to see that as natural and normal. But I’m not sure that it is.

I always envisaged Homesongs as a multi-generational thing. A place where people of all ages can come together, and listen. And, possibly even learn.

We’ve had Homesongs that are a little bit like that, but mostly it still feels like a bit of a pipe dream. It also seems to me to be more necessary than ever.

Changing The Question

As a seeker and a dreamer, the question used to be “Why am I here?”.

But that was always the wrong question.

These days it’s become framed differently:

I’m here. What do I do now?

That one can also cause dilemmas.

But at least now there are answers to be found, and adventures to be had in the process.

Make Me Believe

I’ve never been a fan of critiques. Unless it’s along the lines of: “This is what I like, I think it’s great and this is why. You might like it too”.

It’s always seemed to me a little bit small minded to start telling people why you thought something was dreadful.

On this occasion, however … um …. you might well like the film Moonfall, which is on at the cinema at the moment. We took one of our boys to see it. He is 11 and he liked it.

But, and this is obviously a very subjective thing, a million spectacular gimmicks, chases, and edge of the seat impossibilities, will never, ever beat a great story, and a well crafted script. The gimmicks bore me to tears. They always have. And it makes me a little bit angry when so much money is being thrown around and so little care is given to the parts of a creation that I think matter. Hrumphh.

I do feel like a bit of a killjoy sometimes though.

Especially when my foster son asks me why I’m laughing when the world is about to be destroyed.

Causing Smiles

Ryan just said: “Can you find a way of getting ‘Ryan is cool’ into your blog.

It wasn’t that hard to be honest.

It’'s a privilege to have choices, freedom of speech and a life that is not under any kind of threat or danger. It’s nice to be able to use those privileges to put a smile on someone’s face.

So many ways to be able to do that. Some easy, some a lot harder.

But “causing smiles” is not a bad starting point for any of the creative choices we make.

Sprouts And Songwriting

Dad asks Jack to go and fetch some sprouts from the Co-op. Jack pulls a face and groans, but goes anyway. On the way he ruminates on two facts. Not only are his pals playing on Minecraft without him at that very moment … also he’s getting sprouts with his tea.

Could life get any worse?

In the other corner, as far as his Dad is concerned when he’s sitting down to eat later, none of Jack’s mainly internal moaning affects the taste of his sprouts. They still taste good!

And the very loose moral of this story is: if someone loves a song they mostly aren’t that bothered whether the song was written on a good day or a bad day, or was etched on the back of a beermat in the songwriter’s blood, or floated down in a dream, or was produced by a songwriting committee using the 4 Divine Principles Of Perfect Pop.

And it doesn’t really matter if anyone else likes it.

They can’t help it. They just love that song.