The Band Practice pt 4

Our Hero dreams of the concert he and his cohorts practice diligently for. When does the dream become life? One way is by living the dream, the other is by being shaken awake by ones bandmate.

The Music: "As Far As We Know" by David Udell performed by Earwacks.

The Lyrics: "Time may waste your dreams"

Earwacks are: Tracy Wynkoop: bass; Benet Schaeffer: drums; David Udell: guitar; Dominic Schaeffer: sax.

The Band Practice pt 3

Part 3: Our Hero drinks before practice. Tracy: "Where's Dominic at?" Benet: "Dunno... Anyone been to his apartment?" Tracy: "I don't even know where he lives..." David says "Oh I know where he's gotta be..." David retrieves Our Hero and proceeds to work on the chord changes for "Listen To Me" then the band rehearses a portion of "This City" followed with "Cold Hans" in its entirety. Then it's time to party with crew, friends and fans!

Our Hero falls to sleep per chance to dream...

The Band Practice pt 2

Part 2: Our Hero stops for coffee before work. He works in a restaurant so he can eat. After work he goes to a bar so he can drink before practice. Music: "92bpmloop" performed by Dominic and "The Trouble With My Treble Is The Space In My Bass" performed by Earwacks.

The Band Practice pt 1

Davids favorite song of mine brought to life in the film "The Band Practice" by Matthew O'Shea and featuring Earwacks.

Story: Our Hero does this. Every morning he does this. Goes to work. Every day. Rain or shine.

LYRIC BOOK

Goodbye, 2008!

I'd say good riddance but there were some very good things that happened last year as well. Not gonna list the good/bad year-in-review here, you all know what is on that list- but there is one thing from last year i really, truly wish that i could undo.

I fucked up. A mistake anyone could have made. A permanent and un-fixable one.

I have always made a point of saving my work- music, drawings, writings, etc.. For instance, in 1997, when i was house sitting for Uncle Albert during their first six-week tour of Germany/Bosnia i made use of the recording studio and archived the 4+ hours of MIDI compositions that i completed to a digital multi-track ADAT tape deck so can mix them later. Shortly after the transfer EVERY sound source in my midi suite broke... Shwew!

SIDEBAR: For the non techy reader- MIDI is not music/sound/audio. It is a programming language that allows a composer to control a variety of sound sources simultaneously. Much like a player piano- a MIDI recorder is like a piano roll puncher- when the person plays the notes on the piano, holes are punched in the roll in the order played and, when the roll is put on a "player piano" it seems to "play" itself. With MIDI you can compose for multiple "player pianos"... But, these are not the notes themselves- only commands for when/which note is played. /SIDEBAR

So a couple years ago i took all those ADAT tapes to FoJammi's studio and transferred the multi track tapes to digital sound files i can work with on my home computer. Thanks to the new home studio technologies i have pretty much everything i have ever recorded in my life preserved for "the ages"... (like anyone else is gonna care- who the fuck am i kidding, really!?!? lol)

Back in the mid '80's began putting all my writing on a word processor. As life went along and i updated computer equipment i always transferred my writings along with everything else. It was in an ever expanding file called LYRIC BOOK. Whenever i needed to refer to it- it was always there.

In March of 2008 I purchased a 500 Gigabyte hard drive so that i could file away the ever growing psychotronics recordings and solo work. I did a very thorough job- also throwing out the redundant and superfluous. The whole process took about three days. Maybe it was too thorough...

January 1st, 2009 i wanted to have my first post be a favorite poem i had written called "69"... LYRIC BOOK was nowhere to be found. I have looked in every folder on every hard drive i have and to no avail. 30 years of writing erased.

I used to pride myself in being able to say i have no regrets. Well, now i have one.

Babaji

I was at a Supertramp concert at The Saint Louis Arena. The "Breakfast In America" tour. Big Supertramp fan. Knew all the lyrics, who wrote what, loved what they'd done and- as this was the sixth album- saw that they had done all they would as a band and was mourning their demise at the top of their game. Usually it's three albums but for the sake of this piece I'll include"Supertramp" and "Indelibly Stamped" (the first two albums i have never heard). "Breakfast" was the fourth commercial success and had at least three radio hits. Anyway...

Roger Hodgson had composed the song "Babaji" on the prior album about the latest incarnation of the eternal manifestation of God in human form. Spiritual longing, questioning of "place" in life and giving ones self purpose, this song was always a favorite of mine. So they're playing this song and I'm all into it and like crying at the beauty and shit and there's this this guy next to me singing it word for word perfect- almost. I looked over at this guy and he was like all into it and crying at the beauty and shit and our eyes met and we acknowledged each other and then he sings "Barbara Jean"... WHAM! Totally crushed my groove. "It's Babaji!" "What?" "Babaji- it's about the most recent manifestation of Krishna- it's a spiritual song." "I thought it was a love song!" I waved him off as an idiot, absolutely ruining his evening, I'm sure.

Dude- you were right- it IS a love song. It's also a blues song, and a reggae song (if you adhere to Bob Marley's definition that any song about Jah is reggae) and, where ever you are- I want to apologize. My burden from this event has been that every time I hear this great song I'm reminded of your face when I so carelessly fucked over your reality. Who am I to "correct" you for your interpretation of a piece of art? I've grown a little since that night and do try on occasion not to be an asshole.

Dominic

SUPERTRAMP - Live - Babaji - Queen Mary College 1977

Snippets of my writings...

The following are small pieces or parts of pieces i had written long ago.

Sell me some stock
and I'll give you a dime
but it's not worth the trouble
not worth the time,
and Love will soon prove
that the lemon's a lime...
Get Moving! Get Moving!
and the old man gets sent to a home.
-from the basement bathroom wall of Duff' restaraunt- 1975

"The Pontoon Flats ribaldo snorfer rides again!"

"The mind dog laps up information like a tongue sponge- Arf! Arf! "

"I'm a very weak person- i can only carry a grudge."

"Shit!"

more to come as i remember them.