Bengal Burlap now at Bandcamp

I'll be honest.  I've no clue. 

But stuff like "Grunt Grunt Pig" and "Encounters With Insects" is now downloadable via Bandcamp.



Price varies according to my whim.  And yours.  Sometimes the album minimum price is 5 bucks US.  Sometimes it's zilch.   (Sorry,  I'm going through a crazy time right now . . . )  But from that minimum on the rest is up to you--name your price.   In any case, the album of 11 tunes is the value package.

Meanwhile, still considering reupping the soon to be dead streaming links.

the author of Grunt Grunt Pig

I couldn't fully claim that distinction without crossposting here.

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 . . .

they call me Mau-rice . . .

Okay, no one calls me Maurice. And this, um, song bears little relation to the Steve Miller Band. Press the play button below (or click here) and we'll continue . . .

Grunt Grunt Pig


(UPDATE: Grunt Grunt Pig is out on Bengal Burlap, available at Bandcamp.)

One old friend, Dom, suggested I make a t-shirt for myself that reads "I am the author of Grunt Grunt Pig".

Sometime back circa 1982 after:

--an even older friend had convinced me to take up the electric bass to play in a band he & I never actually started

--I had heard the records of Fred Frith, Laurie Anderson, Wm. Burroughs, Brother Dave Gardner, the Go-Betweens and heaven knows who else

--I got a Panasonic cassette boombox at Best Products to go with my trusty all-in-one record/cassette/AM-FM stereo

I thought I was some artsy hipster type ready to record some music.

This I believed even though I was actually a twenty year old college student who was spending the summer where I'd grown up--on my parents' hog farm in rural southeastern Virginia. Rows of peanuts, soybeans and corn stretched out to dusty lots where the sounds of metal hog feeder lids clanging shut echoed in the trees beyond.

I was a hick from the sticks. Armed with some obscure records (mostly those of my friend & never-to-be bandmate), aforementioned consumer electronics, some stray musical instruments, and sheer delusions of grandeur.

Many of my friends from around this time who heard the resulting din still think Grunt Grunt Pig is one of best things I ever did. Well, it's certainly one of the first things I ever did. And yes, I like it.

All these years later, no matter how near or far any new bit of music may be to this first thing, I am still the author of Grunt Grunt Pig.

And no one calls me Maurice.