Wheel's Reinvention, My Sweet Plaything, Fried Chicken Blues

Wheel's Reinvention



My Sweet Plaything



More spookiness of the unreliable narrator variety.


Fried Chicken Blues



Another scary tune . . one that pushes some of the already dark lyrical impulses of the Blues clear 'round the bend.

Comfort Waltz, Winter Palace, Hear Me Call

Comfort Waltz



Winter Palace


Hear Me Call

All three songs were written in the mid 1980s. All bear some grandiose notions-- the latter two wanting to be something like Fairport Convention circa "Tale In Hard Time" with a touch of Mission of Burma, Hüsker Dü, et al.

(Yeah, go ahead, laugh . . .)

Whatever they are or aren't in terms of concept or execution, they are some of my faves.

Gratuitous geek note: Hear Me Call might be one of the first things I recorded with anything sequenced besides a drum machine. Indeed, I used the band's Roland TR-505 drum machine as a rudimentary sort of MIDI sequencer to drive my bandmate Dale's Korg Poly-800. Still doing the passing between two cassette decks trick, I could record the drums, a very basic synth bass and whatever live stuff in one pass.

The versions of the others were recorded later on with, at the very least, the best MIDI gear a Caldor or a Lechmere could offer.

T-Improv, Smashed In Doors

T-Improv



Smashed In Doors

Instrumental for Plug, Endlessly

Instrumental for Plug



Endlessly

Penguin Beach, Wel Don 2, Home Groove Theta

Penguin Beach



Wel Don 2




Home Groove Theta

Oboe Arabesque, Home Groove Piano, Home Groove Bop

Oboe Arabesque (aka The Hurling Dervish)



Home Groove Piano




Home Groove Bop

Faraday Cage, I've Got A Doll Now, Fear Itself

Faraday Cage


I once met an intelligent, self-possessed fellow who talked of how he and others were having signals broadcast into their heads. That kick-started this song. The bit about "Flowers By Irene" is an allusion to a Simpsons episode.

I've Got A Doll Now



Maybe some of this comes from Talky Tina on the Twilight Zone, but it was loosely based on a macabre dream I had and was meant to be more open-ended/less literal-minded. Something spooky that was nonetheless about loss & change.

I never made up my mind where the singer is moving off to in the last verse--maybe boarding school or college or a psychiatric hospital. In short, the singer has healed, is healing, or needs to start healing. I like that a listener can take it in any direction.


Fear Itself

Never Young, Sweet Days Gone, Sun Rises

Never Young


Sweet Days Gone



Sun Rises

Better Listen, Better Go

Better Listen

Better Go
(Also on Box.)

In my bossier moments, titles advise and outright order . . .

Ordinary, Try

Ordinary


Standing out, blending in--hard to know if one really want or choose one or the other.


Try