The Newts Of Night

Here's a fun little experiment!! I have friends who are talented in the Electronica music scene, but I'm not terribly well versed in it myself...I find that I keep hearing things in a more concise, song-formed structure. So this was me just fooling around with MIDI and loop collage, but I like the way it turned out. Recorded, as you might imagine, very late at night. I think the textures are hypnotic and pleasing, but I'm biased. And anytime I can get a digeridoo happening in a song, it makes my day better!! Anyhow, hope you enjoy it.

Another Fool

Jumping slightly out of the sequence of YouTube postings for this one, just because it felt like the right song for the day!! I wrote this song while on the road touring with Michael Katon, on a borrowed guitar in someone's basement apartment we were staying at between shows. I like the way the lyrics turned out, and I'm pretty happy with the overall recording! I did this one quickly for my Song-A-Week challenge, so I didn't think too hard about things, which was really helpful. Keys and Percussion are done with loop generation software, and Bass, Guitar and Vocals are all me. I double-tracked the Vocals in parts of the chorus. On the guitar solo I think I was aiming for a Carlos Santana sound, but sort of wound up in Earnie Isley's "Who's That Lady?" territory. Of course the aforementioned are geniuses, and there are so many of my friends who are brilliant guitarists who can play rings around me! But I feel that I can pull out a nice melodic solo now and then, and this one was pleasing to me, and a first take, too, which was nice.

The song itself came from a conversation with a friend of mine who was waxing cynical about the nature of love, saying that it was all just chemical in nature and really just an illusion. I kind of though he was protesting a bit too much, and that there was some back story that might explain his opinion. And, actually, there was. We all get hurt at some time in our lives, we all get our hearts broken, but I still think that love is real, and worth it.  

Lyrics:

ANOTHER FOOL

He says, “Love is a lie of nature, sent here to wreck your mind

A genetic time bomb, it sets you up and then it leaves you blind”

He’s talking like he’s so immune, like he’s already seen it all

But I’m thinking that pretty soon another fool is gonna have to fall

He says, “Yeah, it’s just a fact of science, man, all the proof is strong

It's just a chemical stimulus, and it doesn't last all that long"

He likes to think that he's so in tune that he'll never ever hear the call

But I'm thinking that pretty soon another fool is gonna have to fall 

Gonna have to fall, gonna have to fall

Gonna have to fall, gonna have to fall

You can hide in your own cathedral,

You can lock the doors to your keep

And you can bury yourself in your guitar -

Love it knows your scent and sound

And it's gonna track you down

Doesn't matter who or where you are

In a secret room where he never goes, there's her picture there

There's a secret part of himself, whispers out that it's still not fair

But time's gonna heal his wounds and it's gonna break down his walls

And I'm thinking that pretty soon, another fool is gonna have to fall

 

The Strange Parade

I do like this one!! This is a song I wrote some time ago, partially inspired by the Anime movie Paprika by Satoshi Kon, the brilliant director who also created Millennium Actress & the wonderful Tokyo Godfathers. I highly recommend his work, which really stretched both the field of Anime and the art of storytelling in major ways. He sadly passed away in 2010, but he leaves a fascinating and moving legacy.

When I wrote and recorded this I originally did it just on the acoustic guitar, tuned in an open tuning (I think DGDGAD), and with a shaker loop to keep my timing honest in case I wanted to add something later. MUCH later, I added a percussion track. Later still, when I was working on my Crazy Project (I was challenging myself to finish a song a week), I contacted my old friend Paul Vornhagen to help with a flute track. Paul is a wonderful guy and a fantastic multi-instrumentalist, an accomplished Jazz musician and very knowledgeable about Latin music, and Cuban music in particular. He agreed to come in and laid down two takes of flute, both of which were great. I took a bit from one and a bit from another, edited that just a little, but very little.  I re-recorded my vocal (I'd had a scratch track I put up just before Paul got there), and added a bass part, and that was that!! A little mixing and mastering stuff and I was finished.

The theme of this song is something that I feel more and more as time goes on...we're all haunted. If you live long enough, you will be. Time presents us with ghosts, in the form of memories, of old feelings that appear in the middle of the night to surprise, scare or delight you. I think the best thing we can do is to be aware of their presence, because then you can try to deal with them accordingly. Either embrace them, fight them or let them go, but don't ignore them. That's the dangerous option!!! 

Nocturnal Dreamwalk (Theme From "The Vampires Of Cleveland")

Here's an experimental bit from a while back...I was having fun with heavily echoed guitar and strange female vocal loops, and it turned into this kind of spooky thing that I rather like. Loops, keyboards...I was taking loops of my own playing and incorporating them in the mix, I'm pretty sure that the bass is all mine, and the various layers of keyboards...the guitar was all played live, with the Cubase plugins providing the spacey echo. I enjoyed working with these singers, although I have no idea who they really are. This sounds very soundtrack-y to me, hence the name. Alas, "The Vampires Of Cleveland" was never produced!! But you never know, it might be, sometime.

Cynthia has told me that at some point I should release an instrumental album. Being as no one seems to have interest in either albums or instrumental music these days, it would have the advantage of being doubly obscure!! But I might just do it. Heck, who knows what I'll do.

Shooting Stars

In my ongoing attempt to get all my videos up in an accessible space, I'm putting up this one...hope you like it! Early this year I decided that I'd try to finish a song and a video every week for a month, just to get myself back into the studio. It's a project that's actually still going on, although I'm not quite at that level of productivity now. Shooting Stars was the first of that attempt...written some time back, I had actually found that I'd done some of the rhythm tracks long ago and forgotten them (drums, bass, organ)...which speaks to my organizational capacity or lack thereof! But anyway, I still liked the sound of them, so I built the rest of it up off of that, and I think it works...I was keeping myself going with the time constraint that I'd agreed with myself on, so any bumps and flaws, well, that's all part of what's going on.  As I say, you don't like it, go do your own darn tune!

This song is another one I wrote about my friend Alan Leis, a pal I used to play music with back in the early Jurassic period. A talented drummer and a sweet guy, he could pretty much pick up any instrument and make some music with it, something I was pretty impressed with. We had many adventures, musical and otherwise, and then drifted into our separate lives. He passed away much too young, and reflecting on that I wrote this song and the song Technicolor Summer, both about my memories of him and my musings on time, life and the Universe. Yeh, I wish he could have hung around longer, it would have been interesting to talk about things at this juncture. Miss you, man.

I'll be going up the timeline from now on with this vlog, posting these videos in the order that I originally put them up on YouTube, with what commentary I can include. Please let me know if you have any questions about anything, or if you enjoy these, or if you'd really like me to just stop it for gosh sake. You've got my number.

                            
                                            THE SHOOTING STARS

                                  Up in the hills in midnight Michigan

Watching as the meteors cut the air

They start to burn up when they hit this planets’ sky

I can’t help thinking now how they seem like you and I

We flew in on fire in our Technicolor past

Even then we knew that ride was never gonna last

Your accelerated fall was sure something to see

You were always faster then than I could ever be

You were always so much more than me

I’m tired of fightin’, I’m tired of  cryin’,

I’m tired of bitin’ on this cold iron

I know up in the sky another eye looks down on me

And I’m afraid of what that eye might see

The shooting stars are falling fast and free

When it all came down we were still young in a young world

Never thought I’d get this old at all

Here in the cold autumn with the strange celestial glow

I wonder if I missed the place that I was supposed to go

How will I ever know

I’m tired of fightin’, I’m tired of  cryin’,

I’m tired of bitin’ on this cold iron

I know up in the sky another eye looks down on me

And I’m afraid of what that eye might see

The shooting stars are falling fast and free

I haven’t always been the man I thought that I should be

Wonder if it matters anyway

When I finally flame out and my soul turns into smoke

I might get to see you and to share that final toke

And appreciate the joke

I’m tired of fightin’, I’m tired of  cryin’,

I’m tired of bitin’ on this cold iron

I know up in the sky another eye looks down on me

 

Chase That Chicken

Here's another song from the as yet (at this time ) unreleased album "Atomic Weasel Ball". I did this just so Cynthia could have a little video documenting her first chicken flock...but I had the song already, so it seemed like a natural fit. More loopery, as was evident on much of AWB. I would like to do a more elaborate video someday, with special effects, people in chicken costumes dancing around and me in salty overalls and a straw hat, but this'll have to do for now. Chickens, by the way, have got to be some of the dumbest animals nature ever provided, but therein lies some of their charm, I guess. And the fresh eggs are marvelous!!

CHASE THAT CHICKEN

You say you're lookin' for something to do

I've got something just for you

Tired of livin' out on the farm

You say that the country has lost it's charm

Here's a thing that'll change your mind

Leave that old ennui behind

You might think it's a little strange

But hear me out till I've had my say

Chase That Chicken

Feathers flyin' everywhere

Chickens flyin' through the air

Try it once and you will see

Get a taste for fine poultry

Chasing chickens gives a boost

Better than the books of Marcel Proust

You might even surprise yourself

And get like Gonzo and The Swedish Chef

Chase That Chicken

Chase that chicken all around

Chase it till you get downtown

Chase the one that you like best

Buy that one a party dress

Take that chicken to a movie show

No one else is gonna have to know

Chickens, yeah, they're gonna blow your mind

And you'll have to shift your paradigm

Chase That Chicken

The World Outside

Here's a song from a while back, from the album "Atomic Weasel Ball"...that's STILL unreleased!! I really was gonna put it out, but so much was happening in my life at the time I was finishing it that I put it aside and let it sit. That said, I still think it's got some pretty cool stuff on it and I promise to get that going very soon. Your waiting will be rewarded...by more waiting, as Dave Brockie from GWAR used to say. Anyhow, I'm fond of this tune, and I like the way the video turned out too. I originally wrote this with my wife Cynthia's mother in mind, as she was going through some very difficult times with dementia...she asked me once at breakfast if I was the one who had come to pour milk in her eyes. I assured her I had no intention of doing that, but the phrase stuck with me. So partial writing credit to Ellen.

The album "Atomic Weasel Ball" was started shortly after "Arphus", and was kind of a reaction to it, I think. I'd been working on playing almost all of the tracks myself for so long, and I was pretty sick of hearing myself and my own licks. This was when I started doing songs that were all, or nearly all, created from loops, mostly just for fun at first and without the intention of making finished songs. I had really resisted the idea of this early on, because A. I hadn't actually played those bits and B. I didn't want to be "Led by the nose" with the pre-recorded material. But as time went by my perspective changed. True, the easiest thing to make with loops was bad-sounding Hip Hop, but with some time and work I found that I could create tracks that sounded very musical. And I'd certainly used other musicians before for tracks! These guys were just not in the room at the time. I'd had to edit studio musicians tracks, too. The other part, the being led...well, I'd been led by my own licks and limitations, and using some other people's  was helping me generate new ideas, ones that neither I or the artists who made the loops had had before. It was all in the juxtaposition of different small bits, and the manipulation of them...some are cut in even smaller pieces and shuffled, some are modulated to different keys, some are reversed, and many are all three...and there are a lot of other manipulations. It's really a bit like collage, in a way, except in an audio format. So for good or ill, I started getting kind of loopy. This song is all loops...I'm not actually playing any other instruments than the Acid Pro 6 and the Cubase 5. Oh, and singing.

 The lyric content on this song is, as I've said, about aging, and about memory loss and confusion, and about my hopes and ideas of reality and afterlives. It looks from the video as though I believe that after we die, we apparently turn into birds, butterflies and sunlight. And who knows, perhaps we do. I still like the quote concerning reality from Robert Anton Wilson..."I don't believe in anything, but I have my suspicions". I certainly have strong suspicions!! I have plenty of anecdotal evidence from my own experiences, but proof...well, all I can say is that we'll all find out someday. As I said in the song, I really don't think there's anything to be afraid of. I don't think the Universe hates us. In fact, it may be quite the opposite! All the best to you out there.

Mumbo Jumbo (with the Anti-Gravity Kings)

I think this was the first video I ever posted to YouTube! It's an old document of my band The Anti-Gravity Kings that were playing back in 2010 or thereabouts...it was a fun group to be in, and had a great deal of talent. John Crawford on Drums, Ralph McKee on Bass and Lap Steel Guitar, Myself on Guitar and Bass, and Tom Wall on Keyboards. The sound is less than pristine on this, but I hope that the vibrancy and fun of the band translates at least a little bit. This post is dedicated to the memory of Tom Wall, our Coyote Joker & Cosmic Glue, a great guy and a wonderful musician. Wherever you are now Tom, I hope it's somewhere filled with peace, joy and great music.

The Sea Is Filled With Horrible Fish

Moving from the past towards the present, here's another song I did long ago and that was on the Arphus album as well...I had fun with this one. Originally I had done the bass solo to a drum track, goofing around, and it sat there for a while until I started to assemble this. I think the drum track came first (another loop, basic at first and then fleshed out later), and the echo-y guitar, then a bunch of other guitars & several tracks of basses. One that I like was a guitar playing in fourths, that I played at half speed and then speeded up...I still can't play that line in real time! And of course that undersea-sounding bass solo, some synths & percussion, with the Salty Sea Captain explaining everything.

This was one of my first photo montage videos, and as you can tell, it's fairly primitive...but I still like it. I found some amazingly grotesque fish, and I think the sequence works well. Today, it would be different, but ahh.

One thing that was amusing to me was that after I finished Arphus I sent a few copies out to my friend Tim Jones from the great band Census Of Hallucinations, and he passed it around to some of his friends in the European underground music scene. Somehow it was apparently taken note of by a BBC subsidiary in Scotland, where it became the #1 Vocal Tune for 2 weeks!! Vocal Tune? Really? Well, whatever you think. Thanks Tim!! I'm still thinking of experimental music fans in the far hills out of Queensferry or wherever, listening to this on their radios late at night. All the best to you all out there!!

                              THE SEA IS FILLED WITH HORRIBLE FISH

The sea is filled with horrible fish

And horrible fish are they

And the mariners curse the fish from here

To the shores of Mandalay

But the horrible fish, they do as they wish

In the dark and briny deep

And they do it all day in a horrible way

Till they finally go to sleep

Not content to be in the measureless sea

Where the whale and the plankton flow

There’s a secret door in the ocean’s floor

That they open to travel below

Through the secret door to the earth’s deep core

All the horrible fish descend

And they do things there more horrible still

Far away from the eyes of men

I was out, just me, on the billowing sea

When the horrible fish appeared

I have terrible tales of what they did to my sails

And my captain’s hat and beard

Now a man might eat of the horrible fish

But a wise one, he might not

Far better they swim in the waters dim

Than a good chef’s bouillabaisse pot!

 

'Lectric Chair

This video was from another song on the Arphus album that I released in 2008. I like this one a lot, and I think it still holds up pretty well with the stuff I'm doing now. I started it a good while before 2008 though, and I was using a drum loop facility that was VERY difficult to use, although the sounds and performance were excellent. I got into loop manipulation, something I use quite a lot of now, originally just to build up drum parts, mostly because getting drummers into my home studio on time and sober was so hard to do!! To give my drummer friends some credit though, I lived way out in the boondocks back then, and I had very little money to recompense anyone with, and their time was limited too.

 So I started working with loops, because I really disliked drum machines. A loop is a small unit of a recorded performance of a real musician playing (originally these referred to actual loops of magnetic tape, back in the misty past, as used by The Beatles and others), and by arranging a bunch of these 1 to 4 bar phrases, you can build and entire drum part, complete with stops, builds, fills and hits. It does take time, and this one certainly did!! I played Synth Bass and Keys, and did all the guitars. The Sax parts were my first attempt at loop manipulation of something that wasn't a drum part, and I thought it worked well, although, again, it took a while. The guitar solo was done in one take on the spot, very quickly, I believe directly through a Vox Tonelab LE. Vocals are all mine.

At the time I was doing this, the video editing programs I had (again, for free, since I was as usual broke) left something to be desired!! In one, the audio would wind up distorted when I uploaded to YouTube...another would crash over and over, taking any unsaved work with it. I had to learn a lot of patience, but I did get it done, and I still like the way the photo montage worked!! One of these days I'll get a real camera, then watch out.

This was one of my Dad's favorite of my lyrics, which pleased me at the time and says something of his dark side I think!! Then again, his poetry, while brilliant (it won a Hopkins Award, among other things) was not all butterflies and light either. I think the fact he liked it makes me like it even more. And while the song is full of sturm and drang and argument and misunderstanding, it isn't without a little hope at the end, I think!! "Talk it over, if you dare". Anyway, please don't fry me over this one.

                                            ‘LECTRIC CHAIR

Sittin’ in the ‘Lectric Chair, hopin’ you won’t pull that switch

One of us is guilty here, but I’m not sure of what or which

Seems like we were only talkin’ when the lightning filled the air

I can hear the thunder rumble

Sittin’ in the ‘Lectric Chair

Something that I said or did or maybe looked a certain way

You’re staring at me like I know, but from this seat it’s hard to say

Now it’s like a Kafka novel, or that old Bob Dylan song

Sittin’ in the ‘Lectric Chair

And I don’t know what I’ve done wrong

Too late for a court appeal, or the Governor’s reprieve

You have got the power to fry me if you think that’s what you need

Maybe you could show me mercy, talk it over if you dare

‘Cause it doesn’t feel so groovy

Sittin’ in the ‘Lectric Chair

 

Welcome to the theatre!! Video #1 - Kenji

Hello and welcome to the Reptile House Records Movie Theatre!! I've set up this blog site to share our various videos (and there are quite a few by now), and to also add some notes about the video, music production and songwriting involved. I'm Todd Perkins, also sometimes known as Beowulf Kingsley, and I live out in the swamps of Michigan. I've been a musician for a loooong time, and writing and recording have always been one of my great passions. I hope you enjoy these!! And please feel free to comment or contact, unless you really hate something, in which case, go make your own dang videos. 

I'll start at random with a video from 2011, from my album Arphus Schmarphus Horkus Porkus. This one's called "Kenji" and is about a young Sumo wrestler who finds his destiny in a very different world than he expected to.

Notes on production: This song took forever to record and mix. I was really just learning how, and getting all the guitars to sit together well on the track was a real challenge at the time!! But I think it worked out. I had some celebrity help on this one...Drums are by Mick Fleetwood, and the Harmonica is by Peter "Madcat" Ruth. Mick was assembled from his component parts, though...I had a collection of loops of his drumming that he graciously made available, and I put together his drum part with the help of the Acid Pro program. This also took forever. Madcat, on the other hand, was kind enough to come to my home studio and contribute his part live. Amazing musician that he is, he did the fantastic harp solo in one take. You may notice that his instrument is highly colored with effects...those were selected by him, and were part of his rig. He rarely uses these but decided that this tune justified them, and I would certainly agree his part is perfect for the song!! 

One last note on this tune...the lyrics are about finding what you love and pursuing it, even if the world seems to have other expectations. I had finished the album, and my wife had met a friend in one of her groups that was going through much the same kind of things. Strangely enough, he too was Japanese, and also named Kenji (although he was NOT a Sumo wrestler!). She asked if I might give him an album, thinking that the song and its message might be helpful to him at that point. Apparently it really was, and he sent me a message thanking me for encouraging him in a very difficult time in his life. I've always felt that if I could just help even one person with my music, that all the struggles would be worth it, and it made me feel great that I could make his life a little better. Thanks Kenji!!! 

KENJI

Kenji the mighty Sumo

Was a mountain of a man

Many men that came to fight him

Took one look at him and ran

He was strong and he was skillful

Beating all his foes with ease

Like a Nippon high-powered wrecking ball

Knocking big towers to their knees

Kenji the mighty Sumo

Was the king of the Budokan

The results of long-term planning

From ambitious Dad and Mom

He had wealth and power in his hands

And all that that can mean

But Kenji the mighty Sumo

Had a different kind of dream

Kenji the mighty Sumo

Had a different kind of dream

That he got from an old jazz record

From a place called New Orleans

And he’d put on that old record

With a wistful kind of sigh

And sometimes alone in the dead of night

You could hear poor Kenji cry

Well, he finally couldn’t stand it

Took a boat out late at night

Rode a train across the USA

To the Crescent City’s lights

Now he plays his harp down at the bar

And he’s happy as a clam

And the people come from near and far

Just to hear Big Kenji’s band