Forget About the Moon, Forget About the Stars

When he woke up on Easter morning she was lying next to him, on her side, her angled arm propping her head as she must have been watching him sleep.

She leaned over and kissed him, over and over, across his face until he pushed her away. She laughed, jumped up and ran out into the living room in her t-shirt and panties.

When she came back she was cradling something in her hands... a wicker basket with green cellulose strips coming out over the edges and a small collection of Easter eggs, chocolates, and a few whimsical toys -- including a small, palm-sized rubber duck wearing a sailor hat. It wheezed asthmatically when he squeezed it.

It was too much.

She'd been laying this tender trap for a while now, he knew, and he'd been watching it with a certain detachment.

But now he could feel himself falling, helplessly.

And it was OK. It was good. He allowed himself to be enveloped by her warmth.

She kneeled by him on the bed, her skinny arms sticking out of her t-shirt, her hands on her bare knees, watching him. He looked in her eyes for a long time and then pulled her down toward him, holding her for a long, long time before he let his hungry mouth find hers.


That was Sunday. On Friday afternoon she called from work. They hadn't been planning on getting together that night, but she asked if she could see him. She knew he was going to see a band he'd been working with later that night, but she said she needed to see him for a little while, anyway.

As she walked in, he knew something was wrong.

Her eyes only met his for brief moments and she walked around the room anxiously before she finally sat down. He sat across from her, at an angle, a few feet away.

She was silent for a very long time. He could see she was crying.

Finally she blurted, "I'm so confused..."

And all he could think, deep down, as the darkness started spreading through him, all he could think was... You're so confused? You're confused?

Over her shoulder, sitting on the corner of his desk, he could see the little rubber duck, its sailor cap jauntily to one side -- as it always would be...


Forget About the Moon
[songwriter demo w/ backing instruments]
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original acoustic version (AYoS 2006-02-08)

FORGET ABOUT THE MOON

forget about me
forget about you
forget all those pretty things
we were gonna do

forget about the moon
forget about the stars
forget about forever
we've already come too far

forget about the times
you lay by my side
forget how I thought you'd be
there all my life

forget about the moon...

forget about those dreams
they're just castles in the sky
forget all those plans we made
lying awake at night

(C)2006, TK Major

It's Only Been a Million Years [v.2]

I'm writing today's post backwards.

So, you'll have to wait a little while until I can ammend this post with some... uh... content.

Ah... I'm back.

There will be some reading this who will question my understanding of the basic precepts and conventions of the blog form. To them I say:

Conventions are for Shriners.


Actually, it was just that I hit the SUBMIT button by mistake -- and the robots who act as majordomos to the blogosphere's infrastructure get downright hissy when you ping them and then there's no blog there when they trundle over to see what you got.

So I ended up for a few minutes with nothing much but a picture and some links to today's song (as well as a link to the arguably superior earlier version).

Now... you may say... how is that really different from -- hey, don't hit that backbutton yet... oops. Too late. Everyone else, maybe I just ought to direct you to today's song (with a quick sidenote to my fellow podcasters and musicians).


PRODUCTION NOTE: Once again, I used my new 80 dollar Samson C01U USB microphone to record the day's track. (This time Iused the software EQ, reverb, and compression tools I normally use. Or misuse, as the case may be.) I mention this only because I waited for months for someone to buy and report on the quality and effectiveness of this mic, in vain. You can take a look at yesterday's post which is more or less devoted to the subject.

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It's Only Been a Million Years

One day you'll wake up
and figure out I've gone
Only thing surprising
took so damn long

It's only been a million years
since I had a dream
It's only been forever
since I felt a thing

One day I love you
next day I don't
Hard to believe
You didn't know

It only takes an instant
for the hottest flame to die
it only takes forever
to spend your life wondering why

It's only been a million years
since I had a dream
It's only been forever
since I felt a thing

(C)1990, TK Major

Now, Baby, It's Never [v.2]

[Still spun from the creative frenzy of writing a new song, I'll be taking a break from my normal scribbling, here, so that I can decompress a bit and blab about a new toy that may be of interest to some of you.]

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The ever-minimal AYoS project ratchets up its minimalist impulses with today's posted track, recorded strictly with my new $80 USB microphone and my laptop and a pair of headphones.

My fellow podcasters and musicians may want to take note of this mic, since it combines in one (roughly 2 pound) mic shell a reasonably decent mid-size condenser mic, a preamp, a 16 bit audio-to-digital converter, and a USB interface. For 80 bucks (US) at music gear discounters.

Because of the nature of USB, there is a delay in monitoring the incoming signal from the mic over headphones while performing -- so it's best to turn off input monitoring. That means you might have to use the old trick of partially lifting one headphone to better hear your voice, acoustic guitar, etc, when you overdub.

The newly recorded tracks should match up, though, on playback. USB uses a time stamping feature to realign synchrized audio data. That said, various DAW (Digital Audio Workstation) softwares have different ways of dealing with the tiny timing inaccuracies inherent in current digital audio applications.

I saw this mic announced early last fall and kep waiting to hear from someone who had bought one -- which I thought would be almost immediately, since it attempted to fill a particular need and at a very low price.


I posted in a couple of audio forums about the mic, hoping to provoke interest, but month after month, no one reported buying one. I finally got tired of waiting, picking one up at one of the local music megastores this afternoon. Packaged in a reusable plastic bubble pack that serves a moderately protective function, it came with a special USB cable [don't mix it up with others] and a mic clip for mounting on standard or European stands.

It's pictured here (on a sheet of standard 8.5" x 11" paper) with a stand I ordered online for about $19 with shipping. (Quiklok A188 Desktop Tripod.) As you see it here, the stand is still attached but folded back for transport.

I'm blathering, I realize, but I know there's been a fair amount of curiosity about this mic among laptoppers and podcasters. Anyone who wants to ask me more about it can use my contact form to email me.

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previous AYoS version

Now, Baby It's Never

Everything you say
seems to mean goodby
Though we talked forever
I never did know why

Now baby its never
our time wont come again
This time forever baby
This time it's the end

Tonight when I kissed you
it burned me to my soul
Everything I thought I knew
was all a lie I know

Now baby its never...

I walked along the aqueduct
just before the dawn
The sun looked old and tired as it came up
but at least the night was gone

Now baby its never
our time wont come again
This time forever baby
This time it's the end

(C)1991, TK Major

Forget About the Moon

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New song. Brand new. Written minutes before this was recorded.

Too tired to write more. Must sleep.


Addendum: I had, perhaps obviously, just hit 'the wall' as I was posting this song last night. It had been so dang long since I'd written a song that when I found myself writing this late yesterday evening, I pushed hard to finalize it enough to record it and get it posted.

I suppose it's a little late for me to act sheepish about posting my lyrics, but I was struck last night by just how little of the flavor of the song is captured by the printed word. It is, of course, often problematic printing out short rhyming lines meant to be sung... they have a tendancy to look even lamer than they may or may not sound and syncopated rhythmic phrasing of the sung line has a tendancy to look awkward at best on the printed page or screen.

But, well, that's what we do here, for better or worse, so... without further ado, my new song:

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Forget About the Moon

forget about me
forget about you
forget all the pretty things
we were gonna do

forget about the moon
forget about the stars
forget about forever
we've already come too far

forget about the times
you lay by my side
forget how I thought
you'd be there all my life

forget about the moon...

forget about those dreams
they're just castles in the sky
forget all those plans we'd make
lying awake at night

forget about the moon...

(C)2006, TK Major

Without a Thought of You [v.2]

previous AYoS version

To think that I once felt sorry for you.

That's what he was thinking as he watched her from across the room. She was standing close to a tall guy in his thirties with greasy hair and round silver studs embedded in his temples that gave him the look of a late fifties American car.

Her pretty dark eyes danced across the tall guy's face -- but he knew from watching her at scores, maybe hundreds of openings and parties, that she was making a kind of dynamic topological map of the room, charting not people's height but their stature in the art community.

And he knew that the flattering attention in which she bathed Mr '59 Chrysler Imperial would be duplicated maybe four or five times that night with different men or women.

She would undress as he lay naked on the bed, and give him, unbidden, undesired, a detailed debriefing of the critical art scene intel she had gleaned, dishing caustic, funny slaggings of the very people she had seemed to fawn over earlier in the evening.

And, when, finally, she got on the bed, on her hands and knees above him, naked, and her pretty dark eyes danced across his face in the flickering candlelight, he tried to make his mind a blank.


About this version: I think I have to say that I prefer the previous version of this, from December 26th last. I especially like the artwork, which is an (unintentional) self-portrait. (The signature was added as a joke and to tie it to the song.)



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To think that I once
felt sorry for you
it's all that i can
bring my puny brain to do

you must think me quite naieve
and don't think I ain't gonna leave
i just want you to know
what you put me through:

I won't ever have a dream
without knowning it won't come true
I wont ever think of lonely
without a thought of you

Fallin for you
was a stretch for me
all your arty friends,
importaant people to bleed

as every artists knows
every show that
opens must close
you can put it in 30 pt type
in my review:

I wont ever think of lonely
without a thought of you
i won't ever have a dream
without knowning it won't come true

I wont ever think
forever
without knowing it's
really never
I won't ever think of lonely
without a thought of you

(C)1995, TK Major

Little Baby Doll (v.2)

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Some mistakes you just have to make.

No one can tell you.

You can't talk yourself out of it. You might as well surrender, sometimes.


You can hear a somewhat more spare version in the October 15 AYoS post.

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Little Baby, Little Baby Doll

baby started something
back in 1986
baby started comin home
and showin me new tricks
Little Baby
Little Baby Doll

Baby said forever
just takes too much time
but Baby said "I'm here right now
so that should work out fine"
Little Baby...

Baby liked to gamble
with the things she said she loved
but Baby blew her hands
when push came to shove
Little Baby...

Baby played the vagabond
baby played the whore
baby played with fire
she's not playing any more
Little Baby...

"Veni Vidi Vici"
Baby said when she came home
I said that's fine for Caesar, babe
but Babylon ain't Rome...

Saw her on the street one day
but I didn't call her name
After all this time I knew
that Baby's still the same
Little Baby
Little Baby Doll

(C)1993, TK Major

2 Dazed 2 Care (v.2)

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original 1982 dark new wave recording [soundclick page]

Winter stretched from a time before memory into a future he could no longer imagine. Fear seemed like a dream from a happier time -- a time when there was still something left to lose -- A luxury that had already been spent and borrowed on.

Now, there was just winter...


This version adds a little accompaniment guitar but is fairly similar to the previous AYoS version, from last November 7. And you'll find a very, very different version just added to my band's soundclick.com page.

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original 1982 dark new wave recording [soundclick page]

2 DAZED 2 CARE

Turn down this street
back down that alley
there is no escape and there is no stalling

The future is here
and it's more of the past
All I remember
is falling and falling

Leave me alone
just let me be
with wounds this deep
they just have to bleed

Desperation is short supply
I used up my panic in the crises last year
It's hard to worry, it's hard to care
when you're so tired of anger
and you're so tired of fear

Leave me alone...

No point in crying, laughing or dreaming
no point in love, no % in fear
desperation is in short supply
so tired of anger
2 dazed 2 care

Leave me alone
just let me be
with wounds this deep
they just have to bleed

(C)1982, TK Major