On November 7, 1986, I met Jon Anderson from the progressive rock band Yes outside Royce Hall at UCLA after a Vangelis concert. The next day I drove up to a house in the Hollywood Hills and started work with him on a script for an album that he released in 1976 called Olias of Sunhillow. This was the first concrete steps in an idea that began when I was 19 when some friends introduced me to the album at the same time that they introduced me to a couple of other things, including the possibility of playing in a rock band. Finishing the script took a little while longer than I thought, and it turns out, it also took quite a bit of self study on the strangeness of the world for context. In 2010, I finished a 100 page rough draft of the script, which culminates on December 21, 2012 at 11:11 a.m. with a theophany of sorts in an ancient spaceship on the planes of Nasca Peru in front of a temple that actually exists there. I was a bit hesitant to contribute to what I thought would be some of the madness that would coincide with this day, so I sent it out to a few people (and thanks for the feedback), but I did not really “shop it” as they say. In honor of the events of today, although I think most of the hype is a heaping pile of b.s., I have uploaded the script to my website if you’d like to download the PDF. You can find it here:
Everything on that album is him, including incredibly complex symphonies of voices. If you have heard my music and wondered where Psychedelic Lullaby came from, now you know.
If you want to hear the album on Spotify, search for Olias of Sunhollow, I know not why. And if you’d like to read a little bit about how it was made, here’s the Wikipedia link:
In 1860, an 11-year-old girl wrote to Abe Lincoln, suggesting he grow a beard. He not only responded, he obliged.
“Hon A B Lincoln…
Dear Sir
My father has just home from the fair and brought home your picture and Mr. Hamlin’s. I am a little girl only 11 years old, but want you should be President of the United States very much so I hope you wont think me very bold to write to such a great man as you are. Have you any little girls about as large as I am if so give them my love and tell her to write to me if you cannot answer this letter. I have got 4 brothers and part of them will vote for you any way and if you let your whiskers grow I will try and get the rest of them to vote for you you would look a great deal better for your face is so thin. All the ladies like whiskers and they would tease their husbands to vote for you and then you would be President. My father is going to vote for you and if I was a man I would vote for you to but I will try to get every one to vote for you that I can I think that rail fence around your picture makes it look very pretty I have got a little baby sister she is nine weeks old and is just as cunning as can be. When you direct your letter direct to Grace Bedell Westfield Chautauqua County New York.
I must not write any more answer this letter right off Good bye
Grace Bedell”
Lincoln responded a few days later:
“Miss Grace Bedell
My dear little Miss
Your very agreeable letter of the 15th is received — I regret the necessity of saying I have no daughters — I have three sons — one seventeen, one nine, and one seven years of age — They, with their mother, constitute my whole family — As to the whiskers, having never worn any, do you not think people would call it a piece of silly affectation if I were to begin it now?
Your very sincere well wisher,
A. Lincoln”
While he made no promises about the beard to Bedell, he stopped shaving and allowed the beard to grow not long after their exchange and was elected as the 16th president of the United States a few weeks later. On his inaugural train ride from Illinois to Washington, D.C., the president-elect stopped in Bedell’s hometown of Westfield, N.Y., and asked to meet her.
This line goes against all modern logic regarding political grooming: “All the ladies like whiskers and they would tease their husbands to vote for you and then you would be President.” But you know what? If a presidential candidate grew a beard, I would vote for him.
“All the ladies like whiskers” is prime t-shirt material.
Hey guys, can we talk as fellow humans for a minute?
It’s cool to see the jubilation and relief and pride of Obama supporters right now. Good for you — the man and ideals you believe in won and that’s terrific. You ought to be celebrating.
But the people behind Mitt Romney or Republican politics are not necessarily some brainless, heartless army of evil mutants. Could we stop with the salt-in-the-wound posting of pictures of their team being disappointed and defeated and humbled?
I sincerely don’t get it.
A lot of people I greatly admire on Tumblr seem to be politically active and vocal because they care about things like compassion and tolerance and looking beyond our preconceived notion of what people deserve and supporting them because THEY ARE PEOPLE. Because our humanity is reliant on each other. And I think that’s amazing and admirable.
But I’d like to humbly point out that the people you disagree with? They’re still people too. And you can take the piss out of Todd Akin or any other rape apologist all day long. But posting countless photos of defeated political supporters or Romney in the most humiliating hour of his life for the sheer purpose of mocking them because their side lost and they are clearly assholes and scumbags?
Tell me we’re better than that.
And if America has any hope of conducting less expensive, more thoughtful and nuanced political campaigns — of running intelligent, principled, courageous candidates for both parties (hell, all parties) — it’s going to be because we as an electorate conduct ourselves with greater civility and demand the same of the parties. It’s going to be because we remember that we are humans and in this together and that we don’t know these people from adam and surely there has got to be something — anything — more constructive than standing over the pit of their defeat, cackling and calling names.
I’m probably biased here. Because I have been on teams that won and teams that lost. Let me rephrase that — I have worked beside cohorts of humans who worked themselves to the point of sleepless nights and vomiting mornings. I have watched some of them put their name on the ballot and keep their shoulders up when the opposition and the media railed against them not just for their positions, but for their past marriages, their finances, their kids’ mistakes. Their weight, their gender, their age. I have watched really good people lose and I have known the crushing despair and humiliation of working your heart out, and losing.
I’m surely not saying that everyone in these “White People Mourning Romney” pictures are decent and good. But I am saying that you don’t know they are all bad. I can assure you that in almost every campaign I’ve ever seen, it’s a mixed bag of nuts and jerks — and a majority of really dedicated and passionate servants who simply look at an issue in different ways from their opponents. You don’t have to like them or respect them, but again, I humbly ask you to consider that this kind of vitriol is a significant part of what’s polarizing this country. That we have as much responsibility as Congress to conduct ourselves as if we are united in the shared interest of doing this great American experiment better.
Please, let’s just let each other be this week.
It’s a glorious thing to win and it’s a classy thing to do it kindly.
Ohio really did go for President Obama last night, and he really did win. And he really was born in Hawaii. And he really is, legitimately, President of the United State - again.
And the Bureau of Labor Statistics did not make up a fake unemployment rate last month. And the Congressional Research Center really can find no evidence that cutting taxes on rich people grows the economy.
And the polls were not skewed to oversample democrats. And Nate Silver was not making up fake poll numbers about the election to try to make conservatives feel bad; Nate Silver was doing MATH.
And climate change is real. And rape really does cause pregnancy, sometimes. And evolution is a thing. And Benghazi was an attack on us, it was not a scandal BY us.
And nobody’s taking away anyone’s guns. And taxes have not gone up. And the deficit is dropping, actually. And Saddam Hussein did not have weapons of mass destruction.
And the moon landing? Was real. And FEMA is not building concentration camps. And UN election observers are not taking over Texas. And moderate reforms on the regulations on the financial industries and the insurance industries in this country are not the same as communism.
Listen. Last night was a good night for liberals and for democrats, for very obvious reasons. But it was also possibly a good night for this country as a whole.
…But if the conservative movement and the conservative media and the republican party is stuck in a vacuum-sealed, door-locked, spin cycle of telling what makes them feel good, and denying the actual lived truth of the world, we are all deprived, as a nation, of the very debate between competing, feasible ideas about real problems.
Last night the republicans got shellacked, and they had NO idea it was coming. And we saw them in real time - in real, humiliating time - not believe it even as it was happening to them. And unless they want to secede, they will need to pop the fictional bubble they have been so happily living inside, if they do not want to get shellacked again.
On July 31st, I saw a blog post on Tumblr for a Soundcloud.com offer/contest. They were offering up to a $5000 Fellowship program to help complete projects that would incorporate soundcloud.com as part of the project.
I ignored it at first but the day before the deadline, I decided to take a chance. I recorded a little bit of voiceover in my studio describing my project, and added some samples of the new cd I am currently working on. I have an album that I’ve been working on for awhile, and I was seeking financing to get it mixed. I wrote a bunch of songs for The Gandhi Method when I was in that band in San Diego, California in July 2003, and most of the songs were either written just prior to or during my short tenure in that band (about 5 months). Some of the songs were inspired by the experience of being in the band. The band was founded by Sven-Erik Seaholm and Chuck Schiele, and they were looking for a third member. I was introduced to Sven by Scott Lee, who is a drummer/attorney in town, at a Carlos Olmeda show at Lestat’s. Carlos was recording his album with Sven at the time, and he recorded the group chant for a song called Willamena in Lestat’s (a local coffeehouse) on that night. Sven gave me a copy of his new cd at the time, called Upload, and we met a week later at his house, and I brought a short work in progress cd that became a few of the songs on this current cd that I am currently working on.
Here’s the link for Carlos’ cd, which is called The Other American:
I left The Gandhi Method around Christmas of 2003 and Cathryn Beeks replaced me (http://www.listenlocalsd.com). I played some bass, and guitars on a few songs, and did some background vocals for one song (Turn Away), on the album Hi from The Gandhi Method, which was released in 2004. The band was nominated for a San Diego Music Award in 2004.
Before:
After:
I went on to playing bass with Cathryn’s band (The Cathryn Beeks Band) after The Gandhi Method ultimately broke up, before I formed my own band and began playing acoustic and electric shows here in San Diego, and occasionally in L.A. The first versions of the bands were called Scott Wilson (electric), and Scott Wilson (acoustic), and then afterwards, Scott Wilson and the Complications (acoustic) and Scott Wilson and the Contradictions (electric).
Anyway, back to Soundcloud. It turned out that I did not win a Fellowship. It looks like 184 proposals were submitted and 15 of them were approved. But the good news, something that I did not know at the time, was that everyone who submitted a proposal was given a one year Pro subscription to soundcloud.com. I already used the free service for my music. It’s basically a way to post your songs on the web, and they can be conveniently posted to Facebook and Twitter, etc… But whereas the free service allows 120 minutes of music, the Pro Service offers 36 hours of uploads/music.
So I have been busy in the last week. I have posted four of my cds on the site.
Hard rock/Progressive Rock:
VFX (self titled) - I played bass, wrote most of the songs, and produced the disc.
VFX “the next step” - played bass, some keyboards, wrote some of the songs and produced.
The VFX cds did pretty well in Europe. ”the next step” hit Number 1 on the Imports Charts in Kerrang Magazine in 1993, and topped Queensryche at one point in the process. I’ve basically sold out on the original printings of these cds (1000 copies - 1st VFX self titled cd, and appx. 1400 of VFX “the next step”). Most of them were sold in Europe, where they weren’t so enamored with Nirvana since it came out at about the same time. I went there for a 4 week promotional tour for the cd and went to MIDEM to shop the VFX cds in late 1993. I was in Venice Italy when the Northridge Earthquake hit in January 1994 north of Los Angeles, California. I was living near Venice, California at the time. My TV was broken in the earthquake when it fell off a shelf, but luckily everything else, including my home studio, survived. I was offered an independent distribution deal at MIDEM, but decided instead to form Cruel World, and start from scratch, since 1980’s music was basically crushed in the early 1990’s thanks to Nirvana, Pearl Jam, and Smashing Pumpkins, among other bands. VFX turned into a cult-like underground band/cd that had its detractors and supporters, and I am often surprised by the amount of magazine coverage those cds received. I have friends that I met during that time that I still correspond with regularly, and despite the difficulties (and there were many), it was a pretty fun experience at times.
The Cruel World cd was released in August 1995. The band financed the recording but the cds were bankrolled by an independent label in Germany. We toured Europe briefly in August of 1995, and a video was made from that footage and can be seen at:
It was an alt rock band, more in line with the trends at the time. We played at PopKomm, which was a big convention in Cologne Germany, and we did a few radio interviews and gigs in Germany, Belgium, and The Netherlands. We were nowhere near as big as Gregory Page (from San Diego) is there now, but it was fun nonetheless. I sang lead vocals and played bass in this band, and it was my transition from being a bass player/singer, to a singer/songwriter which happened during that period between 1994 -1997.
Back to San Diego:
At the time I met Sven-Erik Seaholm in 2003, I was still working on the Kaleidoscope’s End cd, but it had not been mixed yet, so I was still in the process of applying the finishing touches on that album, ultimately released in 2005, but it was pretty close at that point. Just prior to our meeting at Lestat’s in 2003, I went to Germany and wrote a bunch of songs for a friend that I had met during the 1995 Cruel World tour named Michael Ketteniss, in late 2000-2001 . I spent 3 months there in Aachen Germany, saw George Bush inaugurated on CNN Europe, and basically saw the whole stolen election process from a German perspective. And I also discovered Stereophonics, which is a great band from England that is very big there and in Europe, but played in San Diego at The Epicenter to 150 people. They sell out Wembley Stadium regularly.
So, as a result of this soundcloud.com opportunity, I have decided to post as much material that I can get my hands on, including demos (old and new), soundtrack songs ( I wrote songs for the films Tombstone, Better Way to Die and Henry Poole is Here), instrumental songs I wrote as part of the Behind the Music: Bobby Brown VH1 show that was broadcast in 2009, and various other bits and pieces that I have. Some of them were recorded on 16 track analog 1/2” tape in my home studio in Los Angeles, where I lived until 1997, and a lot of them were recorded in my home studio in San Diego California, which happens to be right next to my bed. Luckily there is very good soundproofing in my place, and I’ve only gotten one noise complaint because I forgot to close the window (it was hot.) My studio in San Diego is basically a personal studio with Digital Performer software, Pro Tools LE, Garage Band, with a digital preamp and interface, and a MacBook Pro laptop. I have been recording most of my material with that configuration, and I also record drums at studios/rooms around town since my system is portable. These are some other bands I have recorded over the years:
I worked as an freelance engineer at Universal Sound when it was at the Clairemont Mesa area in San Diego. It was a 24 track ADAT studio, and many of the drums and guitar solo tracks for Kaleidoscope’ s End were recorded there, among some of the bands on the MetaLogic Music Recording Myspace page.
I have also included/uploaded the complete set of demos that I recorded for the album that I wrote in Germany in 2000-2001. After I returned from Germany in Ferbuary 2001, I was in L.A. working on a short documentary for Nikka Costa, who just played at Del Mar Racetrack in Del Mar, California opening for Ziggy Marley on Saturday night (9/1/12). She is a great performer, and I try to see her whenever she’s in San Diego. I recorded the demos at a home studio in the San Fernando with a friend of mine named Brian Yaskulka, who has had some pretty good success in L.A. as a producer engineer. He and I wrote 3 songs on the Kaleidoscope’s End cd and he is also a very good singer. He mixed a few of the songs on the Kaleidscope’s End cd also. The Germany demos were pretty quick demos just for copyright and so I wouldn’t forget them. I recorded them in the evening after working all day on the Nikka Costa video press kit as an editor. The project was a documentary on the making of her first album on Virgin Records - Everybody Got Their Something. My demo cd was ultimately mastered by Justin Stanley, who is Nikka Costa’s husband, and also a great producer/engineer in L.A.
Nikka’s album was released by Virgin Records in 2001. She’s played with Prince, she’s got some songs in films, she’s just great soul singer. I thought she was great at Del Mar this weekend and she never disappoints.
So far I’ve uploaded about 220 songs on Soundcloud.com . I think I have 23 hours left, so I’ve been going through my DAT (digital audio tape) collection and transferring a large number of songs from that library into my computer, and then uploading them onto soundcloud.com. That means I’ve got about 13 hours of music up on the site, including demos, masters, soundtrack instrumental stuff, etc.
To get an overview, you can go here to see the sets, which are collections of songs, like an album, or a folder:
I’m still getting permissions for some of the songs from co-writers, so in the coming weeks I will be uploading as many songs as I can find onto the site. Some of the songs were written and recorded in the early 90’s when I first bought a Tascam 16 track analog recorder, and a Allen & Heath mixing board, so they are basically experiments in songwriting and production/engineering, and it was the way I learned to be a songwriter and an engineer. Some of them are pretty rough, but they illustrate a process, and I thought it might be interesting to someone who was interested in how someone develops into who they are. There are some pretty good songs in there, and the occasional stinker, but I decided to try to put some stuff out there and see what happens. I have been performing a number of these songs since 2005 when I released the Kaleidoscope’s End cd, so although my bands have been familiar with the demos, chances are the only way that anyone heard any of the original versions of these songs is if I had an email relationship with someone. I have also been discovering alternative mixes and original demos from the Kaleidoscope’s End cd (Marielle, Too Tired, Shade of Eden and Coffeehouse 101) so I am also posting those on the site. I have also been going through some live recordings from my 1990’s band Cruel World and will be posting some of those songs in the coming weeks. In addition, I also regularly post songs from Soundcloud.com on my Facebook musician site at:
The deal with Soundcloud.com ends in a year, so after that, they will be taken down, or the subscription will expire (September 2013). I am open to people buying recordings on the site, and I can work out the details for anyone who is interested, if they would like to contact me.
I have a Paypal account, so it is pretty easy to do for anyone who is interested, and if there is enough interest, I may even earn enough as a musician to finance the mixing of my latest album, which is one of the reasons I’m doing all this.
I am currently working on two albums at the moment. One is pretty close to finishing - I am going through notes at the moment, and the other was written in the 1990’s, and I started recording it in March of 2012 in San Diego, California. Nathan Walsh-Haines, a local San Diego drummer, played drums in my rehearsal studio downtown in March 2012, and I played the bass and most of the guitars, and so far, Jonathan Hayes (VFX), Tim Orrahood, Keith Boyce, Mike Walter, and Norm Merton have all played lead guitars on the tracks. I am working my way through guitar solos, then lead vocals, percussion and then polishing, which may take a little while.
That’s an additional 30 songs in total, which I will be adding to the souncloud.com page if I get them finished within the next year. It is my hope to get the mixing financed for the album that’s basically done, hopefully as a result of shopping some of these demos on the site, and then finishing the other album I’m working on a little later. Michael Ketteniss has decided to finish the songs I wrote in Germany for him in 2001, and I have sent one song (and all the audio files) as a test to see if it works, and then I will send the rest. I recorded drums with Phil Woodring from the Donnis Trio from San Diego California for that disc, and I hope that it gets done one of these days. Until then the demos are available for the album, and can be found at:
"For once, I’d like a pool report to tell the truth ‘Candidate x got off the bus and addressed an enthusiastic crowd with the exact same platitudinous crap he said four hours earlier to another equally enthusiastic crowd. There was no sense to it whatsoever, but man, these people really ate it up. And his enemies will twist his words into slightly offensive shapes and make a big dumb boring hullaballoo about it until the nation finally stirs itself to end this thing with their votes"
Hey folks! Here’s your latest update on the 2012 SoundCloud Fellowship.
The call-for-entries phase has ended and you can explore all 184 sound creation project proposals right here. What’s next? Well, tomorrow we will hand over the project proposals to our amazing panel of judges who will take a few days to assess your project ideas before we announce the final selection here on the blog on August 15.
Lily Allen “The Fear” Live at the V Festival, 2009
Lily Allen pulls off a really tricky rhetorical tightrope act in these lyrics – if the phrasing and inflection was just a little off, the balance of pathos and social commentary would seem hollow, cruel and smug. This resonates because it’s sung from the perspective of the most spoiled possible person, and that character is allowed to be self-aware and self-loathing. But their nihilism only serves as a justification for their petty, shallow behavior - “It’s not my fault, it’s how I’m programmed to function.”
LILY ALLEN - THE FEAR
I want to be rich and I want lots of money I don’t care about clever I don’t care about funny I want loads of clothes and fuck loads of diamonds I heard people die while they are trying to find them
And I’ll take my clothes off and it will be shameless Cause everyone knows that’s how you get famous I’ll look at the sun and I’ll look in the mirror I’m on the right track yeah I’m on to a winner
[Chorus] I don’t know what’s right and what’s real anymore I don’t know how I’m meant to feel anymore When do you think it will all become clear? ‘Cause I’m being taken over by the fear
Life’s about film stars and less about mothers It’s all about fast cars and cussing each other But it doesn’t matter cause I’m packing plastic and that’s what makes my life so fucking fantastic
And I am a weapon of massive consumption And its not my fault it’s how I’m programmed to function I’ll look at the sun and I’ll look in the mirror I’m on the right track yeah we’re on to a winner
[Chorus] I don’t know what’s right and what’s real anymore I don’t know how I’m meant to feel anymore When do you think it will all become clear? ‘Cause I’m being taken over by the fear
[Bridge] Forget about guns and forget ammunition Cause I’m killing them all on my own little mission Now I’m not a saint but I’m not a sinner Now everything’s cool as long as I’m gettin thinner
[Chorus] I don’t know what’s right and what’s real anymore I don’t know how I’m meant to feel anymore When do you think it will all become clear? ‘Cause I’m being taken over by the fear
"It’s not everyone’s inalienable right to get whatever they want. We are charged with making smart decisions for our company, for our shareholders and to present the product the way we believe is best."
—
That’s the guy at NBC who’s more or less behind the decision to show you your Olympics sports on a multi-hour tape delay. You see, world? Your Olympics are a “product,” and watching them aren’t your inalienable right, per your friends at NBC. (via newsweek)
I’m trying to finish some music at the moment so I’ve applied for funding via SoundCloud’s Fellowship program. I have recorded a proposal for the mixing and mastering of the album, along with instrumental samples. For more info please go to http://www.metalogicmusic.com
