beautiful, funny, sad & true

Okay, so here’s the music I was talking about the other day. The songs are now posted on MySpace, so they’re fair game to share with you too.

The band is called SistersBrother, and I played the drums and the bass on all of the songs.

On the song “Knickers” I also played the pseudo-ukelele part in the verses. On “Danger Boots”, I also played electric guitar in the middle section. On “Vampires”, I used tympani mallets for the first two-thirds of the song, then switched to sticks and rocked out for the last part of the song. On “Swallows’ Nest” I also played the glockenspiel and the flute-y keyboard parts that show up at various points throughout the song. This was the hardest song, as far as the drums were concerned. It’s almost like two songs in one, in that it alternates between a Beatle-esque feel and a pseudo-reggae feel, which are very difficult to transition between. The ‘hiccup’ drum parts during the ending section of this song are surprisingly difficult, and they’re the parts that I’m particularly proud of.

I’m really honored to be involved with Sarah and Jimmy’s project, and I’m glad that I’m finally able to share some songs with you.

My head hurts from laughing so hard.

Just got home from rehearsal for the plays. I say ‘plays’ because in about a month, we’re going to be having a night of six short plays, for your pleasure.

I say ‘we’ because I will actually be playing accordion and piano (and maybe cello or something) as incidental music between the acts, actual music for one of the actual plays, and I’m actually playing the actual accordion in one of the actual plays (in which I even have an actual speaking line!).

I say ‘pleasure’ because that is the feeling you will be overwhelmed by if you come to see this show. Allow me to elucidate.

There are six plays in this particular show:

One–written by a member of the reading group–involves a writer’s struggle to create; one explores the nature of how much information is too much to share with a new love; one is a touching story of a father and a son; one–written by another member of the reading group–explores the nature of predator and prey, and involves both goldfish and marijuana; one is the story of the hijinks that ensue when staunchly feminist Amazon women encounter a handsome male ‘diplomat’ in the jungle; and the play I’m in is the story of a girl who wears a coat that’s made out of meat.

If all of this doesn’t sound enticing to you, then gawd help you. I’m honored and thrilled to be a part of this production. I’m going to go out on a limb here, and say that this is Theatah At Its Finest. The show will be on April 12th, and costs a mere ten dollars. Contact me by any means necessary if you’d like to come. If you leave a comment here on BFST, I’ll have your e-mail address.

And now I’m home, eating dinner and enjoying what I like to call a Crash Day, where I stay home and completely unwind after an insanely busy couple of weeks of work, rehearsals, gigs, and socializing. Special thanks to Maddy for making the trek down from Seattle to come to the awesome Stephanie gig last night, and for bringing me some DVD’s of a show I’ve been wanting to see for a year.

And now it’s time to start watching said DVD’s of said show. The Crash begins now.

Oh, and hey. . .here’s the first actual incarnation of OneYearAgo!

I had a great blog-related idea yesterday that I think I’m going to start implementing right away. I call it OneYearAgo, because I thought it would be interesting to compare what’s happening now with what was happening at this time last year.

Naturally I decided to unveil the idea tonight, the twentieth of March, which was a day that it just so happens was entry-free last year. Here’s the closest one, though, by way of example.

In more current news, I got an out-of-the-blue call this evening from MusicProducerSean, who started the conversation very simply, by saying, “You rock!” I was taken completely by surprise, and instantly burst out laughing. Apparently he’s been mixing the songs of Sarah’s that I recently played drums/bass/keyboards on, and it’s all coming together nicely. I can’t wait to be able to hear the songs, and also to share them with you.

That phone call made my day. No, I take it back; it made my month.

More musical news; Andrea’s album is officially finished being recorded, and now we’re trying to decide whether to mix the album ourselves, or to go with an ‘unbiased’ mixing person to give it a fresh approach. I personally lean toward doing it ourselves–the three of us have world-class talents, and Jim’s studio is full of all the best equipment–but we’re also interested in hearing what someone else would bring to the project. So I guess we’ll see. After it’s done, Andrea’s moving to Switzerland. LUCKY.

Time for me to get a passport.

Last night’s St. Patrick’s Day celebration was a total blast.

Played accordion with that pseudo-Irish group I play with occasionally, and I have to say that we totally rocked the house.  The other two bands were total yawners and will remain nameless–partially because I don’t even know their names!–but we had the place packed and the people dancing and singing.  The violinist and I did a bit of Irish dancing too, if you can call what we did ‘dancing.’  Try doing that jig thingy where you jump up and cross your legs behind you while wearing a forty-pound accordion, and after drinking two glasses of wine.  Good times.  My legs and shoulders are certainly sore today!

One guy in the front of the crowd noticed us sweating up there, and seemed to take it upon himself to cool us off by using his straw to spit mouthfuls of cold soda on each of us.  You could tell that he wasn’t doing it in a malicious way, but I’ve never seen anybody do that before, ever.  Gross, but still kinda funny at the same time.  Jeez, dude, if you’re that worried about our hydration, grab us some glasses of water instead of spitting on us.  But whatever.  All is forgiven.

Tonight and tomorrow are rehearsals for StephBand.  Friday is our first show in six months, because Steph was so laid out after masterminding the Uganda shows, and then she spent the next few months collaborating with an electronica guy.  We get to hear on Friday what they’ve been cooking up all this time.  Can’t wait.  And can’t wait to play with everyone again.  I can’t believe that six months have already passed.

Incidentally, I’d like to express my gratitude to those of you who wrote and commented on my previous post about using powers for good.   It seems that I needed to be reminded of a few things, and to take some of the pressure off of myself again.  And incidentally, when Bill Cosby’s name is invoked in a discussion like that, it stirs up things deep inside me, you know?  I was raised on Cos, and to this day I think he’s brilliant and under-appreciated.

So that’s what’s what.  I’m off to rehearsal!

I’ve been in a bit of a funk this week, where writing is concerned. It seems that lots of people are criticizing blogging lately, which I find has left me feeling a bit tongue-tied. I want to make each post Beautiful and Funny and Sad and True, but sometimes that’s a tall order to fill.

The other side of that feeling is that it’s a new one for me. It’s only since I switched over to this new page and got my own domain name and all that. For some reason, I’ve felt much more self-conscious about the things that I write, which I never felt before. Part of the self-consciousness has to do with a certain blog stalker, too. If you’ve never experienced someone crapping all over your online life before, let me just tell you that it really sucks, and that you should count yourself lucky. It has affected my writing in ways I can’t even begin to describe, which is completely abhorrent and unacceptable to me. AND it really pisses me off.

Ironically–and, as if to add insult to injury–as soon as I finished writing that last paragraph, one of my friends actually called to ask me if he could use my picture in a fake profile, so that he could write inflammatory things online.

“No, absolutely not. My stalker did that.”

“Oh, dude, you’re right. . .I’m sorry. I totally forgot; that’s verboten.”

“Yeah, man, you’re on your own on that. Use a picture of Darth Vader or something; anything. Online identities are not to be messed with.”

“Well, that’s the whole point of a fake profile, is for it to look like a real person. . .”

Well, that may be the point of a fake profile, but it’s not what I stand for, and it’s not the point of How To Be a Decent Human Being.

The point of being a decent human being is this; if you have something to say, don’t hide behind anonymity, or pretend to be another person, just be honest. You don’t need to blast the other person out of the water. Honest doesn’t mean ‘nasty’, or ‘insulting’, or ‘character-defaming’, it doesn’t mean ‘ad hominem‘, and it doesn’t mean ‘brutal’, it just means. . .well, here’s a definition that I like:

Honesty is the human quality of communicating and acting truthful and with fairness, as best one is able. It is related to truth as a value. This includes listening, reasoning and any action in the human repertoire — as well as speaking.

That’s a good–dare I say ‘honest’?–definition of honesty.

And a word of warning; not only do you have to be honest about what you say, but also about your motivations for saying things, because if you aren’t honest about that, you may get some unforeseen repercussions, or consequences, for your statements. This is why you need to be careful.

We all leave impressions everywhere we go, and I try very hard to make my impressions positive ones. Not all of them are–I admit that–but I think that the vast majority of them are.

And now, may I take this opportunity to urge you to use your powers for Good in this world. Life is hard enough, without having to deal with any more negativity.