Beck at the Greek

He was a rock star, wearing an orange t-shirt while the rest of the band wore gray.
Showing off his practiced dance moves on particle board.
Strumming a big guitar. Stomping one boot in rhythm.
Sending out bass and drum
to a crowd of sun-sweat smiley college boys and girls
who sat and stood and stared
and clapped and vibrated.
And the middle-aged guys were out in numbers.
Bald under favored baseball caps.
Pants stained from the gogurt
their kids ate that morning.
And everyone had bottled water.
And then the vibration closed
and cooled and stopped.
And the crowd roared at the rock star.
And they roared at each other
And they roared at themselves.
roar.
(image from the show — with the orange and gray swapped out for white jumpsuits — here.)

Bye Bye, Blackbird

I’ll be posting a few (usually fairly short) tunes up as we go. Some solo multitrack homebrew this and that. Some long-distance musica-collabarativo. And the occasional piano/vocal jazz standard from 1926.
Here’s the first tune out the gate, a piano/vocal jazz standard from 1926: Bye bye, blackbird,” written by the great Henderson and Dixon.
playtime:1 minute or so
file specs: roughly 1MB mp3
how to:right-click on the song name and choose “Save Target as…” to download the file. Or just click on the link and wait a minute or so for your player to come up. If it’s jumpy, give it a sec, rewind, and play again — that’s just the file loading in.
Thanks for listening…

They rise, they rise

Sitting and snacking at the local tea shop
surprised to be sucking up
whole tapioca
in a wide straw.
  Bloop.
Endlessly
elevating.
Fat and flavorless and full of --
  Bloop.
Bloop.
Never smooshed
though smooshed
should be
in my not-so-smooth
smoothie.

Why is 6 afraid of 7?

True-fact dialog tonight between my 6-year-old daughter and my 3-year-old son:
She: “Why is 6 afraid of 7?”
He: “Cuz 7 is a monster.”
And I don’t know. I just find that funny.
I mean, yeah, the more traditional response would be “because 7 8/ate 9.”
And sure, that’s what they want him to say.
But really, strictly speaking, he’s right.
9 is gone. 7 is a monster.
And 6 is wise to fear.

Crispy yum yum child of God

The cinnamon chicken
slid off the car roof.
Gourmet exploding.
Big
messy
boom.
  Plate shards, scattered like shark teeth.
Chicken shards, scattered like chicken.
On the driveway. In the lawn.
And jeez:
what a strange fate
  for this
lightly basted
cinnamon flavored
crispy yum yum
child of God.