Midi: Several tracks of treated beats and one track of treated grand piano
Vocals: treated (vocal transformer)
Finished track: slowed down 10 BPMs from original recording tempo.
Lyrics: Inspired from old set lists from other bands found at Hog Farm Annex when Pearl and the Beard played there last night. Jocelyn found three different set lists from nameless bands to use as scrap paper for our set, and, as we read through them, she mentioned they might work well as a 365 song. So, here it is an old set list put to good 365 use. The only rule was that I couldn’t change any of the words to fit the tense. I had to use what was there though I could combine them or split them up. In my original versions of this exercise (I did several), I used all the words, but for this song, I decided to cut a bunch out of it to simplify the piece as a whole.
This is how the set list I ended up using read… (if this is your band, or if you know who this might be: thanks!)
Label pills
El Gusano
Show Me
Ol Texas
Slow Shards
Super Vision
Acreless
Shot n Shot
Throw duck
Jet Fighter
Outside
Show Me Ole Texas
Show me ole Texas
The one we knew when we were younger
An acreless vision
Send me to El Gusano
A shot in the dark
I have super vision
She will see through me
She will see through me
Like your favorite dress
Show me ole Texas
Throw me a label of pills
We’ll drive through the night
Texas.
Pearl and the Beard is goin’ home tomorrow! It’s been a fun mini tour, and it’s been very relaxing. Thanks to all who made it out to the shows! See you soon!
Jonny Greenwood. You are sick. Sick and gross and wonderful.
Oh geez… here we go. I was given the chance to record a radio station ID for Pearl and the Beard (I am borrowing PatB’s recording equipment and have it all with me on tour) for the radio station WRLR 98.3. We have only done two other spots like this in our life-time as a band, I think. These people must get a million of these things, and I felt like it was the perfect opportunity for a 365. I worked on it all afternoon, trying to figure out exactly how to put it together.
Writing: I didn’t have a perfect plan, though I know the music had to house the speaking (I thought about singing the whole thing, but just couldn’t bring myself to do it…) I had in my mind a plan for some kind of harmony first. I did the back ground vocals first, then midi bass (like a previous entry sometime last week). I then added the “main vocal”- the “Subterranean”. After adding all these parts, I basically took a listen to it to fill in where harmonic holes were… where did it need a sound, a fill? Did it need a higher register? A lower register? Which is when I decided on adding the bells. I put a lot of work into getting the tin-y sound of the bells out (removing treble, adding echo and reverb). I added snare and floor tom somewhere in the middle of all that, and since I’m no percussionist, this took the longest.
I knew that regular station IDs are very short. They play these things in between songs and people want to hear music, not musician’s voices saying a bunch of call numbers… so I felt pressure to keep it really short, but it didn’t stop me from letting the whole thing play out. I was careful and sent two versions: one plain one and one for the 365.
I realise, after listening to it a few hours later, I sound quite sad in the station ID… there really is something about smiling while you’re talking, even if you’re alone in a room with a mic… radio people have perfected this art. It really is an art, man.
I sent it to Subterranean Radio when I finished it this afternoon. This is our correspondence:
Hello, Pearl and the Beard.
I host a weekly three-hour underground rock show called Subterranean, and I love your album God Bless Your Weary Soul, Amanda Richardson. Two songs from the album (“Oh, Death!” and “Slow Motion Machine Gun”) placed in our year-end countdown of the top 75 underground songs of the year (#52 and #38 respectively). I was wondering if I could get any of you to record a short message saying, “Hello, this is ______ from Pearl & the Beard, and you’re listening to Subterranean with Mick Cullen and Carl Cutler on WRLR, 98.3 FM.” I would use it as an occasional intro to playing your songs in the future. If you have the time to do it, great! If not, don’t worry about it…I will continue playing your songs in the future anyway!
Take care and enjoy your spring!
–
Mick Cullen, Host/Musical Director
Subterranean
_________________________________________
To whom will read this email:
This is Emily Hope Price from Pearl and the Beard (cello!). I have been given the task of recording the station ID you requested because I have all the recording equipment with me on my solo tour. I am sending you two versions: the plain old regular station ID, and a version I did for you for one reason:
I am doing a 365 Project: 365 Songs. 365 Days. It started on Jan. 4 and your station ID is day 124. It will be up on my blog tomorrow. I hope you don’t mind, but I found your station ID request to be a proper excuse to do a quick song for today. You can use it or not, and I know how radio time goes: station IDs are supposed to be short, which is why I am including both versions. Either way, I hope you have a good time listening, as station IDs can be, well… station IDs.
Hope you are well! Thank you very much for playing our music!
Emily Hope Price
____________________________________________
Emily–
We are honored and thrilled to be part of your epic project! I’m going to have to go listen to the first 123 songs. Quite a project!!
I love the IDs. I will definitely use the embellished one. You’re so right. Station IDs get old…I always hope when I ask an artist to record one that he/she/they will add something unique, some personal flair. You’ve done that in spades!
Thank you so much. Of course we don’t mind you posting this on your blog. If you can post our show’s website (http://subterraneanradio.podbean.com) or a link to it, just in case anyone is wondering why you’d be recording such an odd song, we’d also be mighty appreciative.
Again, thank you.
Mick Cullen
Host/Musical Director
Subterranean on WRLR, 98.3 FM
Anna Vogelzang, Guy Capecelatro III and I have a show tonight (May 7) at Hog Farm Annex in Biddeford, Maine! I’m so excited as Gil and Coco, the owners, are some of the best people out there… hope you can come if you’re in the area!
Subterranean Radio (WRLR 98.3 Station ID – no speaking)
Anyway… well, Jonathan and I have had a long few days. I just returned home from driving him to the airport. While he was still at work today I bought him a ticket to San Diego where his dad is in the hospital in the ICU hooked up to a ventilator. It’s all very sudden and worrisome. I hope you understand me being so late in the posting today… Some things take a back seat when things like this happen. I have never purchased a plane ticket on the day the flight was to take off: what an exciting purchase… if you can call it “exciting”. I packed him a bag, he rushed home from work, and we were off. Luckily, the cheapest ticket to San Diego was leaving from Westchester Airport: a very clean, tiny, tiny, tiny, airport with absolutely no traffic. So, now, I am home. With Lacey. Thinking. Trying to work. We have just eaten turkey sandwiches and a black and white cookie. I concentrate on why the white icing on the cookie is so hard and the black icing is so soft…
This is a song from the RPM Challenge I did with Guy. I spent a ton of time working on a song-study on rhythm and perfect fifths, and then this whole thing kind of collapsed on us. I will finished that song today and get it ready to post: on time! I have the whole weekend alone with Lacey. I will get her to help me on a song, too.
Pearl and the Beard have a show tomorrow night at Webster Hall and then we leave for tour on Monday! Jonathan will still be gone…I will keep you updated on life’s progress as I post…
Oh, Life: you are a cruel, yet tempting mistress.
Recording: I made 2 tracks of cello loops and sent them to Guy and Mike. Guys lyrics are always so appropriate and haunting. I like them. Mike’s piano is perfect… I mixed this one because I initiated it. I wanted to bring Guy’s voice up front: he has a tiny insecurity about his voice and usually pulls it back, but I love it, and think it’s right where it should be. Thanks Guy and Mike!
I Miss The Snow
Down here the trees look weird
And the leaves don’t turn to copper and then fall
I put whiskey in my coffee
Just to take the edge off
Because around here the days are sharp enough to cut you
On Sundays I feel so listless
Cause no one here prays the way we did
Though I don’t know your phone number
I still dial to hear them talk the way we do
If I could just hear even a moment
Of you breathing I might somehow be all right
I miss the snow and I miss Melissa
I miss her sister who screams in her sleep
Good day! Did you know that I love Fairy Tales? Well, I do. Very much. I always had my mother read them to me, and sometimes she would fall asleep reading, and I would insist on poking her to wake her so she would finish them. One of my favorites was The Red Shoes, and I think my most favorite of all was The Little Mermaid (The non-Disney, bloody, depressing version). These stories became real life for me which is why I think I liked them so much – such escapism.
In 1982, Shelley Duvall created Faerie Tale Theatre, a freaking sweet series that starred people like Jeff Bridges (Rapunzel – probably my favorite one), Mic Jagger (The Nightingale), Robin Williams (The Frog Prince), and Liza Minnelli (The Princess and The Pea). You can get most of the episodes on Netflix or buy them even. Maybe most of my attraction to this series is sentimental, but I have watched them recently and still love them.
So, as I have been working on Guy’s RPM Challenge (see day 46) all day, I took a little while to think about what I wanted the 365 song to be today. I was shown this woman’s music today: Tuneyards. I was instantly intrigued by her voice (I really hate pegging someone as anyone other than who they are, but anyone else hear a bit of Nina Simone?) and bold performance attitude. I say that it’s bold because I’ve always wanted to perform sounds similar to this live and chicken out. I do it privately when I think no one is listening and always consider doing something like it and maybe I will now that I’ve see this woman do it. It’s really, really interesting to me, so much so that I would love you to watch this video of her live: Tuneyards: 4AD Sessions. God bless all the musicians fearlessly doing what they love.
So, for the song today, in light of me really not liking solo bowed cello and voice, I tried about 3 different ideas with just cello and voice live. (I have to figure out why I don’t like it by trying it instead of just insisting that I don’t do it.) After a few trials of inspiration and not being happy with the outcome, I totally suddenly and randomly decided to tell the story of The Princess and The Pea.
Recording/Writing: This is totally improvised and all the first and last take. Everything is live and simultaneous.
The Princess and The Pea (A Four Minute Cellistic Retelling)
Hope you are doing well and that you’ve taken your multi-vitamin should you subscribe to such things.
Late again! But this time, just on the posting- it’s an improvement.
I have a dear friend. His name is Matt Singer. I really, really like him. Whenever I’m with him I always feel better, especially when I’m sad.
Mr. Singer is a wonderful songwriter, and he sings and plays guitar. He writes great songs. Wonderful, pretty songs and funny, witty songs, too. He is so lovely. He is also a social worker with a non-musician schedule, so whenever I go to his house it’s always late in the evening, which is fine, but it always reminds me that people have different lives than me. Reminders are always good.
Matt and I met at 8 pm in his apartment in Park Slope in Brooklyn. Neither one of us felt particularly pulled in any one direction song-wise. Neither one of us had any snippets of unfinished songs. Right before I left for Matt’s I had improvised some chord progressions, and I pulled this out as we were talking about what to do. What you hear Matt play on the guitar is that chord progression. Initially, we also decided it would be a nice change to put it into 11/8 time (or 6/8-5/8), but as we moved along, this seemed to change a bit because of the voicing.
We worked for probably an hour on finding a good progression and melody we liked. We were slouching on the couch, not having gotten anywhere we really liked, when he started looping the progression his guitar. I started telling Matt a story:
In his apartment, Matt has a wonderful picture of his great-grandfather from a very long time ago. I wish I had a copy to show you. It is very, very old, and has yellowed. In this picture, there are probably five to six musicians all standing very still, holding instruments, most of them expressionless, all looking very, very handsome in very nice suits. I really love this picture. As Matt and I sat on the couch, slouching, I started telling him this story based on this picture of this man I would have liked to have met.
At first, it was a joke because I didn’t know what else to do, but Matt, for some reason, found it very relaxing to hear a story. How this all came about “lyrically” is hard to explain, but it was important for us to have a few “rules” with this piece.
1. Not too poetic. It needed to be mostly plain and simple. This is why when I say, “He lived to love and loved to live,” Matt says, “Strike that.” That is a line I actually said the very first time I was spewing the story out, and “Strike that” is actually what Matt said right after that, so we put it in. Hence, the second “rule”:
2. We wanted it to be more of an odd, natural conversation rather than a formal storytelling. So, in essence, what you’re hearing us say is what we actually said to each other when we started forming what to talk about. (i.e. “Is there a girl?” “Is there a dog?” Matt asked me both of these things as I was telling the story.) We were also both kind of crushing on this man who is somewhat based on the man in Matt’s picture. I also really wanted him to have some halves of something. And, Matt is part Jewish which ups his sexy quotient significantly, so why not make this man Jewish, too? (Secretly, the man in the story looks just like Matt, but you didn’t hear it from me…)
3. We wanted it to be a little off-kilter and weird: The fact that the man has a temper, but no job, and we state again immediately that he has a temper. The fact that the girl isn’t pretty and there isn’t a dog but the mother always told her there wasn’t a dog: the original intention for this line was, “She wasn’t pretty, not at all, but her mother always thought so and told her so.” It was Matt who reconstructed this to be funny by interrupting with “Is there a dog?” which changed the entire meaning of the statement. The detail about the see-through clothes is hard to explain to you only because it’s what she was wearing in my mind. And it’s funny trying to explain it to you because I really believe she didn’t know they were see-through. It’s just what she had to wear. Hot day, thin dress. You know?
I wanted to emphasize that, though there are times when I make decisions arbitrarily, the choices we made in the piece were all very deliberate (i.e. Me singing the first word instead of speaking it.) We recorded this live three times. I actually liked my delivery much better on the first take, but we both preferred Matt’s delivery on the last, so I just took the last take and called it a night. I liked the first take I did only because it felt like it wasn’t deliberate; like I was talking just to Matt. I liked it, but this one’s okay, too. It was important for me to not be dramatic about the voicing in this piece. We recorded it actually slouching on the couch, being as comfortable as possible. This helped, but the more we recorded it, the more I over-thought the way I was saying things, and I can hear just a twinge of artificiality. It’s expected I think.
This is truly one of my favorites simply because it’s different, and it was like the evening came together just to we could do this piece, just as it is. It’s so weird to express, but I love it. Not that this piece is genius or earth shattering, but with a lot of these collaborations I’ve felt like we were digging out a composition that was already complete, just needing to see the surface. In my AP European class in high school we talked about this idea in regards to Michelangelo who believed he simply “freed the sculpture from stone”. I’ve always romanticized this idea, I think. We aren’t that prolific or legendary, certainly, but I’d like to think even musicians like us can reveal into existence the previously formed.
If you want a good time and want to see a really talented musician and songwriter perform, please see Matt Singer live. He has the most beautifully deep range I’ve heard on a man since coming to New York with his gorgeous rich bass, not to mention his awesome whistle. (He has offered up his whistle for Wakey! Wakey!’s newest album on the song Twenty-Two.)
Matt Singer and I will be getting together again to write a song, song. We did a David Bowie cover together for an awesome event called The Puppet Playlist, a really cool production that has musicians and puppeteers do covers of famous people’s songs. (So far, they’ve done Tom Waits, David Bowie, Magnetic Fields… the list goes on.) If you’re ever in New York during a showing, it’s really the thing to see, and it sells out every single time!
Until tomorrow…
The Singer & The Girl with See-Through Clothes
(sing) On a dirt road not so long ago, there was young man, no, not young, but alive and Jewish, and that’s what matters. New suit, new coat, and though it was hot, he did not remove it. He had bags and long legs. And a hat, and new shoes. Half a roast beef sandwich and half a hard-boiled egg. Salt. He likes salt and gets angry easily. A temper.
Does he have a job?
No. But he has a temper.
Oh.
Do you think he’s lonely?
He sounds lonely. Or sounds like it to me.
Well at any rate, he was handsome. Really handsome. He lived to love and loved to live… Strike that.
Okay. He’s a man. No destination that he knew of, but he walked on, dirt road going on and on.
Is there a girl?
She wasn’t pretty no.
Is there a dog?
Not at all. But her mother always thought so and told her so. There was never at any time she doubted… no, that’s it. There was never any time she doubted. I want her to wear see through clothes.
Okay.
Oh good. That really mattered to me.
So, do they meet?
I hope so.
