Ghosts Of New Jerusalem -- now on Bandcamp

a legacy

My middle brother passed away late last month.

And for better or worse, for anyone in earshot, he had made some contributions to my music. Direct or indirect.

His old sax that he used to play fell into my untutored hands to be used in numerous tunes:

the ever popular Grunt Grunt Pig


the skronky Bobo


the comparatively refined Music and Candlelight


And tho' I'm leery of words like "inspiration", my brother was somewhere in mind when I wrote these:

Cascade


Who in the Heck Are You?


as well as . . .

Slide Back

Slide Back

Halloween tunes vol. 2

Ghost Town



The ectoplasmic bustle.


Lounge Star (Hungry Ghost version)



The mellow moans of all alone.


Whiskey Drinkas



A spirit seeking spirits.


3rd Day of Fog



Play Misty for me?

Flugel Drone, 26 Nov 04 Procession

Flugel Drone


Here's a fave of mine, named more or less for a very, very beat-up acoustic guitar I got in a thrift store on Mercury Blvd. in Hampton VA.

The snapping guitarish sound at pan center? Our special guest star . . .

26 Nov 04 Procession

No Hold, Darlin' Day, Can I Be True?

No Hold



Darlin' Day




Can I Be True?

Bobo, Gamelan Cakewalk, Whine-oleum

Bobo


(UPDATE: Bobo and Gamelan Cakewalk are out on Bengal Burlap, available at Bandcamp.)

I marveled at the remote on/off switch on the garden-variety mic that came with a cassette recorder. At some point I clued in on how that on/off switch could be used during playback when the mic was plugged in.
















Thus the coming & going of that voice and squealing saxophone in the left channel: it's a tape recording that keeps cutting in and out as the remote switch is turned on and off.


Gamelan Cakewalk



The bargain basement tape effect in this instrumental was the cue/fast forward button on the tape deck. I liked this piece but found it a bit long. This was a cassette recording and I lacked the savvy or the nerve to splice tape.

So I just hit the cue button during playback to move things along. I thought of it like some Dada editing method. And I liked that chattering, chirping "screeeeeee!" sound.


Whine-oleum



Years, decades later, I was reading of the Melloman, a Mellotron-ish gizmo fashioned from Walkmans loaded with cassette recordings of instruments.

Too klutzy & impatient to build such things, I went cheap & dirty and tape recorded continuously playing chords on two cassettes. Then with the same remote on/off mic switch control used in Bobo, I'd alternate playback between the two tapes/chords.

Those whining faraway chords in the left channel, the ones that ramp up to pitch when starting and down from pitch when ending?

Yep, those . . .

Robot Angels, Turing Chicken, Whisky Drinkas

Robot Angels (the glossy)





Turing Chicken (the non-glossy)






Whiskey Drinkas (androids & gloss disperse entirely)

On The Fall Line, Someone's Giving It All Back, Goin' Down

On The Fall Line


When I was a kid, I was into light reading like The Book of Revelation and Hal Lindsay's pop concordance The Late Great Planet Earth.

It was a matter of time before some song of mine would reflect an end of the world vibe. Though this could have as much to do with Randy Newman's "Burn On".


Someone's Giving It All Back



From water in flames and sundry apocalypse, we turn to the mystery of a world suddenly ours.


Goin' Down



Ah, that ever lovin' debt postmodernity (or life of any stripe) owes the dust beneath the dust beneath. Or, if that's too opaque or somber, I'll quote Futurama: "vaguely folkish alterna-rock."