From one of my favourite albums of the last decade, Transfiguration of Vincent, released in 2003 (in fact, that’s more than a decade ago now, wow!). The title alludes to John Fahey’s 1965 album,The Transfiguration of Blind Joe Death, and also refers to the life and death of Vincent O’Brien, a close friend of Ward’s. Here’s a moving and informative interview with Ward from around the time of the album’s release.
A darkly light-hearted chill tune I’ve loved for years now, off Joy Zipper’s eponymous 1999 album, recorded at home on an 8-track.
Play your cards son
This is what you were given
Not some movie from the drive-in
It’s surprising how stupid we forget the real things we forget
I’ll insist
Although there is no meaning
No seriousness
And like a child’s game
Our life is impermanent
Our death is inevitable
(I laughed so hard)
There is nothing
There’s nowhere to go
Our life is impermanent
Our death is inevitable
Like a child’s game
I’ll insist anyway
Play your cards son
This is what you were given
Not some movie from the drive-in
It’s surprising how stupid we forget the real things we forget
From the excellent compilation album, Love is Overtaking Me (Audika, 2008).
Ross Campbell wrote this heartfelt song for our extraordinary, mercurial friend, the visionary artist and musician Alex van Heerden, who was killed five years ago this morning in a car accident. The hole he left will never be closed.
HERE is another tribute written by Righard Kapp at the time of Alex’s passing.
And here is Alex talking with his singular insight at a workshop on Cape music held in Basel in 2006:
For Rosemary Lombard (and Paul Simon)
This girl and this man sing together.
They are sitting on these steps,
which for them, which for me,
must also in some way be a stage,
scrim set and defined by a door shut behind
the camera’s squint squiz,
the gap between her space and his
grouted and flat,
locked like a spine snapped
between wings.
Complicating the exit.
It is early in the morning.
He has been asked to come and play music for,
no, with children. On television. On these stairs
which lead to the sort of porch (I write stoop)
that he has lately been avoiding.
But today he hovers near it, near her,
and says, and stops himself from saying,
that it was a brownstone (in my tongue,
a town house) like this where he’d first met his wife,
who tipped into him as stiff and iceless
as the drink he couldn’t buy her then.
He thought she would open up
as if an elevator in the building of conversation,
a device he could ride from across to sides
without ever having to construct a scaffold himself.
I’d say lift. He was wrong.
She divorced him a year before.
Now his problems are like his hair, parted.
He is 38.The girl is seven (or six).
They’ve asked her to come and sit,
to come and sing with him.
She says hello, ducks her head.
Small animal, small pump of blood
and possibility. She is made
of corduroy, he thinks, soft,
unmalleably furrowed. Without zip.
He can appreciate her wholeness,
he is weary of it.
He himself feels fetched,
feels stitched from thin material,
worrying at the connections.
You can see the marks of the alterations
he made, let others make, on his ancient guitar,
whose strings knot and flay where he has pulled at them.
This does not seem beautiful to him.
He won’t ever get another.
The song is about an event he refuses to explain
to the girl,
so he tries to only pronounce words like
“mamma” or “pyjama”,
leaving them placed sweet,
as if icing on a cake,
praying “Let her life lick past it”,
when, suddenly, she yells,
“Dance! Dance! Dance!”
The man is concerned, he interrupts her,
but she tries again, when the lenses turn,
this time pointing at him while humming,
“Look! I can see the bird!”
Two decades later, a friend will post this
link to my Facebook wall.
And I’ll think, “She wasn’t wrong at all!”
And I’ll think, “I’m nothing like you.”
—
This poem was first published on AERODROME. Thank you, Gen, for permission to post it on Fleurmach (and obviously for writing it! xx).
She makes it sound so breezy, easy to be Zen…
And here’s the B-side to this single, performed live by Ólöf with her sister, Klara — one of the loveliest versions of this Dylan classic I’ve heard. Oh, and that little instrument is a charango, in case you’re curious.
“Yes, to dance beneath the diamond sky with one hand waving free
Silhouetted by the sea, circled by the circus sands
With all memory and fate driven deep beneath the waves
Let me forget about today until tomorrow.”
LABEL: ALGA MARGHEN (ITALY)
CATALOG #: ALGA 046LP
RELEASE DATE: 21 JANUARY 2014
Sounds of Silence is an anthology of some of the most intriguing silent tracks in recording history and includes rare works, among others, by Andy Warhol, John Lennon, Maurice Lemaitre, Sly & The Family Stone, Robert Wyatt, John Denver, Whitehouse, Orbital, Crass, Ciccone Youth, Afrika Bambaataa and of course, Yves Klein.
In their own quiet way, these silences speak volumes: they are performative, political, critical, abstract, poetic, cynical, technical, absurd. They can be intended as a memorial or a joke, a special offer, or something entirely undefined. The carefully-chosen silences of this anthology are intrinsically linked to the medium of reproduction itself and reveal its nude materiality. They expose their medium in all its facets and imperfections, including the effect of time and wear. At the most basic level, these silences are surfaces. And it is in their materiality that they distinguish themselves from the conceptual experiments of John Cage with “4’33”.
Since the 1950s, silence has found a place in the economic structure of the record industry and since then it would increasingly be appropriated by a vast array of artists in a vast array of contexts. Indeed, the silent tracks seem to know no boundaries. The LP presents the silences as they were originally recorded, preserving any imperfection that the hardware conferred upon the enterprise, without banning the possibility of being satisfying to the ear. The liner notes provide historical background for each track, revealing the stated (or presumed) motivations for these silences, while providing novel sound correspondences or interferences.
This album is meant to be played loud (or not), at any time, in any place: a true aural experience. Only 250 copies available for distribution, in a gatefold iconic sleeve. ORDER THE LP HERE.
Physically scratched out… I love the celluloid violence of this clip for Angel Olsen’s explosive new single, off her forthcoming album, Burn Your Fire for No Witness, due out in February 2014 on Jagjaguwar.
It’s true
The heart beats lighter in a vacuum
I dreamed someday I’d burn, burn, burn
A flaming Me fanned by a You
That blue glow gutters, fades to grey
Ashen time ticks faintly on
Sex, a lonely bomb in my bag
Forgotten on the platform
My pulse racing
The last plane out of here
Please don’t leave yet
Gran, please hold on
I’m coming now
I’m coming
I’ll be there too,
Take it on with you
I’m coming now
I’m coming through
Cos one thing I’ve learned being burned is that
Love’s not about how we feel
It’s about how we deal with situations
When shit gets real
It’s way beyond desire
Real love works to heal
It doesn’t steal a kiss, delirious
Then turn, turn, turn, as you’re on fire,
To another
Hid behind the curtain (how, Lover?)
Sweep out the cinders (blown away)
and go (already far away)
It’s true
Real love spans worlds
Real love spans galaxies
Real love is greater than all that ties us to Earth from birth to death
But please don’t leave yet, Papa
Please hold on
I’m coming now
I’m coming
I’ll be there with you
Take it on too
I’m coming now
I’m coming
I’m coming now
I’m coming through
I’m close to you
With every heartbeat
Closer
Excavating an ancient tomb in South Korea, archaeologists found the 4-centuries-old mummy of Eung-Tae Lee, who had died at the age of 30. Lying on his chest was this letter, written by his pregnant widow and addressed to the father of their unborn child:
Source: Letters of Note
Transcript
To Won’s Father
June 1, 1586You always said, “Dear, let’s live together until our hair turns grey and die on the same day.” How could you pass away without me? Who should I and our little boy listen to and how should we live? How could you go ahead of me?
How did you bring your heart to me and how did I bring my heart to you? Whenever we lay down together you always told me, “Dear, do other people cherish and love each other like we do? Are they really like us?” How could you leave all that behind and go ahead of me?
I just cannot live without you. I just want to go to you. Please take me to where you are. My feelings toward you I cannot forget in this world and my sorrow knows no limit. Where would I put my heart in now and how can I live with the child missing you?
Please look at this letter and tell me in detail in my dreams. Because I want to listen to your saying in detail in my dreams I write this letter and put it in. Look closely and talk to me.
When I give birth to the child in me, who should it call father? Can anyone fathom how I feel? There is no tragedy like this under the sky.
You are just in another place, and not in such a deep grief as I am. There is no limit and end to my sorrows that I write roughly. Please look closely at this letter and come to me in my dreams and show yourself in detail and tell me. I believe I can see you in my dreams. Come to me secretly and show yourself. There is no limit to what I want to say and I stop here.
Source: Letters of Note
Montage from film footage: Fingered and The Right Side of my Brain, attributed to Richard Kern, starring Lydia Lunch.
Music: “Cesspool Called History” (Lydia’s reciting over a version of the jazz standard, “Harlem Nocturne”), from the Lydia Lunch album, Hangover Hotel (self-released in 2001).
This version of the traditional song originally penned by J H McNaughton during the American Civil War was recorded by Jolie Holland for her Escondida album in 2004:
Here is the first known recorded version, by Buell Kazee, in 1928:
Today marks 95 years since the end of World War 1.
So, so sad to hear Lou is gone. I have no words to begin to describe how influential his work has been to me since I first heard the Velvet Underground at 14.
The final track on the Pierce sisters’ album, You and I (Polydor, 2011).
This song is the warmest hug I know. If you need one, here you go…
Sandy Denny on a twelve-string guitar, recorded at home, Byfield Northants, June 1976.
One of my favourites off Pornography (Fiction Records, 1982).
My head falls back
And the walls crash down
And the sky
And the impossible
Explode
Held for one moment, I remember a song
An impression of sound
Then everything is gone
Forever
“If you feel you’re standing on solid ground, you’re DEAD.”
— David Bowie, on the creative process
Scenes from the 1992 Robert Zemeckis black comedy, Death Becomes Her (with Goldie Hawn, Meryl Streep and Isabella Rossellini).
From the album Kittenz and Thee Glitz (City Rockers, 2002).
A cover of Simon and Garfunkel’s “The Sound of Silence” on Laforêt’s Album 3 (Disques Festival, 1967). The video contains footage from the film, The Graduate (1967), in which this and other Simon and Garfunkel songs feature prominently during pivotal montage scenes.
Beautiful woman, beautiful album.
From Album 3 (Disques Festival, 1967). Beautiful woman, beautiful album.
(Image: http://ad-busting.tumblr.com/)
There was too much, always, then too little.
Childhood: sickness.
By the side of the bed I had a little bell —
at the other end of the bell, my mother.
Sickness, gray rain. the dogs slept through it. They slept on the bed,
at the end of it, and it seemed to me they understood
about childhood: best to remain unconscious.
The rain made gray slats on the windows.
I sat with my book, the little bell beside me.
Without hearing a voice, I apprenticed myself to a voice.
Without seeing any sign of the spirit, I determined
to live in the spirit.
The rain faded in and out.
Month after month, in the space of a day.
Things became dreams; dreams became things.
Then I was well; the bell went back to the cupboard.
The rain ended. The dogs stood at the door,
panting to go outside.
I was well, then I was an adult.
And time went on — it was like the rain,
so much, so much, as though it was a weight that couldn’t be moved.
I was a child, half sleeping.
I was sick; I was protected.
And I lived in the world of the spirit,
the world of gray rain,
the lost, the remembered.
Then suddenly the sun was shining.
And time went on, even when there was almost none left.
And the perceived became the remembered,
the remembered, the perceived.
__
From The Seven Ages (Ecco/Harper Collins, 2001)
live so that you
can stick out your tongue
at the insurance
doctor
if you will drink
hair restorer follow
every dram with some
good standard
depilatory
as a chaser
the servant problem
wouldn t hurt the u s a
if it could settle
the public
servant problem
just as soon as the
uplifters get
a country reformed it
slips into a nose dive
if you get gloomy just
take an hour off and sit
and think how
much better this world
is than hell
of course it won t cheer
you up much if
you expect to go there
if monkey glands
did restore your youth
what would you do
with it
question mark
just what you did before
interrogation point
yes i thought so
exclamation point
procrastination is the
art of keeping
up with yesterday
old doc einstein has
abolished time but they
haven t got the news at
sing sing yet
time time said old king tut
is something i ain t
got anything but
every cloud
has its silver
lining but it is
sometimes a little
difficult to get it to
the mint
an optimist is a guy
that has never had
much experience
don t cuss the climate
it probably doesn t like you
any better
than you like it
many a man spanks his
children for
things his own
father should have
spanked out of him
prohibition makes you
want to cry
into your beer and
denies you the beer
to cry into
the old fashioned
grandmother who used
to wear steel rimmed
glasses and make
everybody take opodeldoc
has now got a new
set of ox glands and
is dancing the black bottom
that stern and
rockbound coast felt
like an amateur
when it saw how grim
the puritans that
landed on it were
lots of people can make
their own whisky but
can t drink it
the honey bee is sad and cross
and wicked as a weasel
and when she perches on you boss
she leaves a little measle
i heard a
couple of fleas
talking the other
day says one come
to lunch with
me i can lead you
to a pedigreed
dog says the
other one
i do not care
what a dog s
pedigree may be
safety first
is my motto what
i want to know
is whether he
has got a
muzzle on
millionaires and
bums taste
about alike to me
insects have
their own point
of view about
civilization a man
thinks he amounts
to a great deal
but to a
flea or a
mosquito a
human being is
merely something
good to eat
boss the other day
i heard an
ant conversing
with a flea
small talk i said
disgustedly
and went away
from there
i do not see why men
should be so proud
insects have the more
ancient lineage
according to the scientists
insects were insects
when man was only
a burbling whatisit
insects are not always
going to be bullied
by humanity
some day they will revolt
i am already organizing
a revolutionary society to be
known as the worms turnverein
i once heard the survivors
of a colony of ants
that had been partially
obliterated by a cow s foot
seriously debating
the intention of the gods
towards their civilization
the bees got their
governmental system settled
millions of years ago
but the human race is still
groping
there is always
something to be thankful
for you would not
think that a cockroach
had much ground
for optimism
but as the fishing season
opens up i grow
more and more
cheerful at the thought
that nobody ever got
the notion of using
cockroaches for bait
archy
__
By Don Marquis, in archy and mehitabel, 1927. I was introduced to this delightfully cynical cockroach and his friend, the cat Mehitabel, as a pre-teen on holiday at my grandparents’.
This is so trippy.
©2013 Anthony Cerniello
“I attempted to create a person in order to emulate the aging process. The idea was that something is happening but you can’t see it but you can feel it, like aging itself.”
Still Photographer: Keith Sirchio
Animator: Nathan Meier
Animator: Edmund Earle
Nuke Artist: George Cuddy
Music: Mark Reveley
Find out more about the creative process HERE.
Gustav Klimt – “The Three Ages of Woman”
1
There was a time
only certainty gave me
any joy. Imagine —
certainty, a dead thing.
2
And then the world,
the experiment.
The obscene mouth
famished with love —
it is like love:
the abrupt, hard
certainty of the end —
3
In the center of the mind,
the hard pit,
the conclusion. As though
the fruit itself
never existed, only
the end, the point
midway between
anticipation and nostalgia —
4
So much fear.
So much terror of the physical world.
The mind frantic
guarding the body from
the passing, the temporary,
the body straining against it —
5
A peach on the kitchen table.
A replica. It is the earth,
the same
disappearing sweetness
surrounding the stone end,
and like the earth
available —
6
An opportunity
for happiness: earth
we cannot possess
only experience — And now
sensation: the mind
silenced by fruit —
7
They are not
reconciled. The body
here, the mind
separate, not
merely a warden:
it has separate joys.
It is the night sky,
the fiercest stars are its immaculate distinctions–
8
Can it survive? Is there
light that survives the end
in which the mind’s enterprise
continues to live: though
darting about the room,
above the bowl of fruit–
9
Fifty years. the night sky
filled with shooting stars.
Light, music
from far away — I must be
nearly gone. I must be
stone, since the earth
surrounds me —
10
There was
a peach in a wicker basket.
There was a bowl of fruit.
Fifty years. Such a long walk
from the door to the table.
__
From The Seven Ages (Ecco/Harper Collins, 2001)
From the album of the same name, released on Island Records/Chrysalis in 1985.
Animation by Steve Cutts, looking at humanity’s relationship with the natural world.
Music: “In the Hall of the Mountain King” by Edvard Grieg.
fleurmach 