Blue

Some albums scare me. Scare me for being so good, so close, so close to the truth...

The Truth? The truth of human existence, I guess? The truth of A(N) human's existence?

Scare me for being a record of that truth, preserved in wax, preserved on tape, preserved in 1's and 0's maybe now... but preserved... captured and preserved.

There aren't a lot of these albums... I mean, there are a lot of really good even great albums... but how many transcendent albums are there? How many albums that actually scare you? A handful? 8? 12? I don't know...

But I do know that one of them is the Joni Mitchell album Blue. Quite frankly, this album scares me half to death and makes me want to stop writing music. Okay, that might be going a little bit too far... actually, that's kind of a lesson in inspiration... a lot of great records have intimidated and baffled me, made me want to quit, made me feel completely inadequate in every musical way possible... until I've wrestled with them for years... broken them down... considered them from different angles in different settings in different times of my life...

For instance: Jimi Hendrix. For years, I loved him, I learned just about every note he ever recorded... but I had no clue where he was coming from... it felt like he fell out of the sky, popped out of Zeus' head fully-formed in 1967, and released Are You Experienced?

But the thing is, even the most innovative artists have context... they all came from somewhere, listened to something, watched something... tried to emulate somebody. And once I started listening to Albert King, I finally got where Hendrix was coming from... that's not to say it made him any less impressive to me... but it made him a little less mysterious... it was comforting to think that, just like I was, Jimi probably sat down in front of his record player (okay, mine was a CD player) and listened to Albert King and learned his riffs. What he did with those riffs was incredible... was where the genius lay... and at least I could hear the connection... really, more FEEL the connection and understand the context.

But there's something different about albums like Blue: it's not the musical innovation per se that is so striking... it's the honesty, it's the absolute truth with which the artist approaches the writing and singing... it's what is captured in the songs... One of the many powers of music is its ability to take one back (in an almost Proustian manner) to certain times in your life... a trigger of involuntary memory and a memory that is deeper than just remembering places and things... a memory that is rooted in emotion, in impression, in something larger than words. Again, this base level of existence and meaning.

Blue will always make me think of two times in particular: 1.) Basting chicken wings in my underwear in my tiny kitchen senior year in college with Greg while singing Old Man at the top of our lungs. 2.) Camping with Ben somewhere on the Oregon coast just steps from the water, sitting around a fire under the clear dark ocean sky, listening to the entirety of the album on a Discman in complete silence. 

One of my students recently brought Blue in, and we listened to a bit of it... and I think it stuck somewhere in my brain that I needed to revisit it... I hadn't listened to it in over a year, maybe even two, and no longer had it in my music collection...

So on Sunday, one of the first (and maybe only?) incredible fall days, leaving Madison after a picture-perfect weekend getaway to visit my uncle, as the growing late-afternoon darkness reminded us that the clocks had indeed finally changed, we drove around town, stopping at three different record stores before finally laying our hands on a copy of Blue.

The first notes of All I Want hit as we turned onto John Nolen Drive and put Otis Redding's watery grave behind us. By the time we got on the Beltline and finally the Interstate, we were in the middle of it... For maybe the first time, I listened, really listened to the lyrics... I've always been so overwhelmed and taken with just the quality of her singing, I guess I've never really listened to the lyrics as closely as I should have...

By the time we hit the open road, River was on... and I finally picked up on the lyrical almost bait 'n' switch, how she starts out writing about one thing and suddenly she turns the tune on its head halfway through and it's a love song... and the way she sings "I made my baby cry," which is the thematic turning point... similar to the Death Cab tune "What Sarah Said," actually... that type of songwriting where there's a punchline, a twist... I still haven't figured out how to do that right.

And finally, on to the last two tunes, which I suppose like the last couple of tunes on any album one tends not to hear as much... In this case, A Case of You and The Last Time I Saw Richard. The verse in A Case of You... "I remember that time that you told me, you said Love is touching souls Surely you touched mine Cause part of you pours out of me In these lines from time to time" I mean, wow.

And The Last Time I Saw Richard... "Richard got married to a figure skater And he bought her a dishwasher and a coffee percolator And he drinks at home now most nights with the TV on And all the house lights left up bright I'm gonna blow this damn candle out I don't want nobody comin over to my table I got nothing to talk to anybody about All good dreamers pass this way some day Hiding behind bottles in dark cafes Dark cafes Only a dark cocoon before I get my gorgeous wings And fly away Only a phase, these dark cafe days"

Talk about a marriage of lyrics, melody, and performance, and again this turn of the lyric at the end, where, just as things get darkest, there's ray of hope... The album finished, and we sat in silence... I guess I modeled the Paper Arrows album, whether it was initially conscious or unconscious, on Blue. Or hoped to model it on Blue. I don't know.

Where am I going with this? I don't know that, either. But I do know that the next time I hear Blue, I'll remember the light of the sunset illuminating a V of geese flying low across the November sky as we held on tight and the car rolled southeast along I-90 back to the real world.

And listened. And heard. And felt.

jbg

Sometimes

Happiness makes you cry.
Exhaustion is energizing.
The fall chill warms your heart.
Memories make you forget.
The past is in the present.

Silence... Crickets... Silence... Crickets... Silence... Silence...

Smile.

jbg

Steel Bones

And the morning came to pass Reflected in the colored glass Falling down on concrete skin And steel bones all trembling Night preys on the lonesome Losing days left and Right and wrong are nothing now The light has come and gone And the day, it sang a song A melody so clear and strong Echoing through broken dreams And steel bones and silent screams Night preys on the lonesome Losing days left and Right and wrong are nothing now The light has come and gone And the evening built a nest Against the winds of midnight's breath Steel bones are crumbling Beneath the weight of all the sin Night preys on the lonesome Losing days left and Right and wrong are nothing now The light has come and gone

jbg

Emerge

Where have I been? Well... for one, I was trudging through the Wasteland that was the 2007 Chicago Marathon. Was it as bad as the press reported? Yes. I think it was. But I survived and finished and, thanks to my generous supporters, raised over $1000 for the American Cancer Society.

So there was that... and recovering from that, physically and emotionally. So I just wanted to stick my head up to say that good things are coming... Much news soon.

Love,
jbg

Explosions Below

Lately, I've been less hesitant. Less uncertain. More decisive. Still, perhaps not quite as decisive as I'd like to be. But better. So... here's something I'm a little hesitant about: sharing some lyrics. What, you say? You're NEVER hesitant about sharing lyrics. Sometimes for weeks at a time, that's ALL you share. And you'd be right about that. (You are SO smart) But these new lyrics are a little different.

 My writing over the last year or two has, I think, veered towards the personal and direct. Certainly the writing on the Paper Arrows' album did. But... lately, I think, I've fallen back a little bit into more impressionistic writing. Which is fine. I've been enjoying it. I think I do it better now... maybe I've found a better balance.

Anyway... So it came as a surprise last week when, on the plane ride home from L.A., I had one of the most vivid, difficult, personal, and ultimately (I guess) rewarding writing experiences I've ever had. It was pretty unbelievable actually... almost out of body.

I had no idea where I was going when I started writing and the whole thing kind of spiraled out of my control and left me a blubbering mess. Literally. Crying as quietly as possible in my seat, tens of thousands of feet in the air, scaring the crap out of my traveling companion... battling with the words in front of me as they poured out of my hand onto the paper. 
I don't know quite how else to describe it.

Out of body is probably the best way. So over the course of maybe 45 minutes, I rocked in my window seat, wept mostly silent tears, and with a singular focus chased and channeled the lyrical demon I'd unknowingly summoned... it just kept going and going and going.

What I was left with at the end of the experience is... something I'm almost afraid of. Something I've been trying to set to music, but not trying too hard... out of fear? Out of... I don't know. So... before I hesitate. Again.

EXPLOSIONS BELOW Explosions below And still lingering dreams Of funerals and arguments And trying to breathe As water runs in From impossible seas Saying goodbye Never leads where it seems To lead Burning my skin Til it peels away And hoping the coast Gives me something to say In the end it turned out I was borrowing days And I opened my eyes Just a little too late It's always too late It's all drifting away It's all fading to grey And I'm watching her go And I'm checking the phone And I'm waiting for love But it's never enough And I'm drying her eyes Like it means we'll survive Like it makes it okay That she's leaving today And taking her things And leaving her rings And I'm missing her laugh It's echoing out In the hollowed out rooms It's echoing loud And I'm sick of the ghosts And I'm tired of hope And I'm tired of tears So tired of tears I'm forgetting the days They're all slipping away I'm letting them fade Into shadows and graves Into thunder and rain Into sunshine and planes And explosions below And I'm hiding my face And I'm trying to breathe And I'm catching my breath And I'm ready to leave And I'm burning her name With my hand in the flames I'm turning the page Of the last thing that she gave me The last thing that she gave me The last thing that she gave me The last thing that she gave me The last thing that she gave me The last thing that she gave me

jbg