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Sunday, April 19th, 2009

Hot damn, Golden Spam (is back)

I just received this piece of spam in my inbox. I had thought the Golden Age of Spam had ended... but perhaps I was wrong. Read this holy writ and tell me you don't get a little hot:

Worn through in the very middle, so as to show namely, at
two hundred feet from the shore, where.

[Couples and Sexuality - Seven Ways to Start Having a Better Sex Life Tonnight Learn more]

All like snakes of virulent poison. Then karna who love nature
in her beautiful isolation and if i have any, said abe.
on his way home that of him. It was impossible to hesitate.
'i told the just, and then pierced him with three arrows.
and swords and other weapons used with the arms as a stalkinghorse,
but there was no doubt about printed editions, all of which
are confirmed as of great energy caught hold of his flagstaff
decked had had for my neighbors dorothy and magdalen he
went home and to bed and morning found him of animals not
slain in sacrifice. One should.

Posted By John Common at: 12:04 am. Add Comment

Sunday, April 19th, 2009

Hot damn, Golden Spam (is back)

I just received this piece of spam in my inbox. I had thought the Golden Age of Spam had ended... but perhaps I was wrong. Read this holy writ and tell me you don't get a little hot:

Worn through in the very middle, so as to show namely, at
two hundred feet from the shore, where.

[Couples and Sexuality - Seven Ways to Start Having a Better Sex Life Tonnight Learn more]

All like snakes of virulent poison. Then karna who love nature
in her beautiful isolation and if i have any, said abe.
on his way home that of him. It was impossible to hesitate.
'i told the just, and then pierced him with three arrows.
and swords and other weapons used with the arms as a stalkinghorse,
but there was no doubt about printed editions, all of which
are confirmed as of great energy caught hold of his flagstaff
decked had had for my neighbors dorothy and magdalen he
went home and to bed and morning found him of animals not
slain in sacrifice. One should.

Posted By John Common at: 12:04 am. Add Comment

Thursday, April 16th, 2009

Night Clouds

i was working in the studio last night on the new record. as jon (my keyboard player) was leaving after the session, it dawned on me to get drunk. so i did. and then drunker.
it was fun. i stood on the porch and listened to 6 or 7 tracks from the new record.
i actually enjoyed the music. i think it took the booze to turn my mind down enough to just listen like a foreigner.

i woke up very hungover as expected. and then wrote this:

Night Clouds

I stood alone in my lawn again last night
Looking up... nothing but clouds.
Neighbors all around, sleeping.
Me, disheveled, lost and ambivalent...
Drunk from the Earth's spin.
And also just drunk.
Everything is in motion, blurry.
We're awash in words masquerading as direction.
Answers aren't hard to find...
But getting the question right... nearly impossible.
And when I find it, center in on it,
Reach and grab it with primitive faith,
Something crosses my mind--a trinket
And I'm back where I started:
Adrift here in my lawn,
Blinking up into night clouds.

Posted By John Common at: 12:04 am. Add Comment

Saturday, April 4th, 2009

New Song: Last Night

this is turning into a song... it's really a slow, smokey, closing time at the lounge, 3am jazz singer kinda thing
--the editor

last night
mar 24, apr 5, 2009

we turned the bars into hotels
we drank until the mission bells
our voices rose and then they fell
I tried so hard to be polite

last night…

we walked all night around the tower
we talked a million miles an hour
the moon became a fossil flower
pouring shots of light

last night...

there's ever only one
it disappears in morning sun
what to do when you know it's done
last night…

I've got secrets that I can not keep
I have this tendency to weep
my lonely ghosts don't let me sleep
but you made it all feel right

I'm standing on the brink… I know
I'm broken, leaking ink… I know
If I could keep myself from thinking
then I might regain the moment

we were standing there in the dark
watching satellites turn in to arcs
gasoline waits for its spark
nothing left to fight

last night...
last night...

there's ever only one
it disappears in morning sun
what to do when you know it's done
last night…
there's ever only one
it disappears in morning sun
what to do when you know it's done
last night…
last night…
last night…

Posted By John Common at: 12:04 am. Add Comment

Wednesday, March 25th, 2009

The International Traveler

If things ever get a little tired, played out and samey-same for you, here's a tip for how to bring some magic and excitement back in to your pedestrian life. It’s a little piece of character acting I like to call "The International Traveler".

Its effectiveness depends entirely on a straight-faced delivery and total immersion in the moment. So listen closely and do exactly as I say. Here is how you will play it:

Slowly, and on foot, you will approach a local citizen of your home town and say, "Pardon me?" while smiling politely (with a dash of sheepishness).

You will then point at your wristwatch and say, in a world-weary voice, "Can you tell me the local time?"

That's it-- The International Traveler.

I've actually done this. Multiple times. In Denver.

Try it. It makes you feel like a senior vice president for a multi-national corporation or perhaps a spy. But don't let the apparent simplicity fool you--it's a complex series of moves requiring nuance, balance and impeccable timing.

Steps you must master:
1) The sheepish, polite smile. You have to achieve a “confused competence” here.
2) Pointing at your wrist says, "I'm not at all confident that I am speaking your language correctly". Don’t tap. Just point.
3) But the real closer is the phrase "local time". It is deliciously haughty. You have to say it like you mean it. Screw this up and your house of cards falls down around you.

Optional moves:
1) Wearing a rumpled suit jacket will raise your level of play significantly.
2) You may squint after saying “Can you tell me the local time?” as if it pains you to have to rely on someone else. This lends believability and gravitas.

Good day, sir.

Posted By John Common at: 12:03 am. Add Comment

Tuesday, March 24th, 2009

Come find me (songwriting)

i've been trying hard not to write songs.

trying to keep my head down, ignore music a bit and let it come find me.

staying interested is the most important part for me. and lately, the hardest part.

lose that and it all falls to shit.

Posted By John Common at: 12:03 am. Add Comment

Monday, March 23rd, 2009

A childhood fear of mine

I remember when I found out that the earth was rotating a hundreds of miles per hour... and worse yet, that the earth was orbiting the sun at THOUSANDS of miles per hour. I was in an earth science class in grade school.

Days later, after pondering these disturbing facts, I began to secretly wonder what would happen if the earth suddenly just STOPPED. I used to fear that I, and everything else on earth, would be flung off into space suddenly. This was a very real, albeit small, fear for me. More like a "concern". Mild anxiety at best.

Sure, I'd get focused on other things, get distracted, eat a sandwich, forget about the fact that I was hurtling through space at THOUSANDS of miles per hour. But then I'd see something that reminded me of momentum, or centrifugal force, or spheres, or spinning, or stopping, and that mental image of everything being flung off the earth's surface would return.

I got over it, eventually. Turns out there are better things to think about.

===================

The circumference of the Earth at the equator is 25,000 miles. The Earth rotates in about 24 hours. Therefore, if you were to hang above the surface of the Earth at the equator without moving, you would see 25,000 miles pass by in 24 hours, at a speed of 25000/24 or just over 1000 miles per hour.

Multiply by cosine of your latitude to see how fast the Earth is rotating where you are.

Earth is also moving around the Sun at about 67,000 miles per hour.

Posted By John Common at: 12:03 am. Add Comment

Thursday, March 19th, 2009

Dream: Ex-GF's Star Wars Toys

Original Post:
March 19, 2009 at 8:50AM

I woke up at 4AM this morning and wasn't able to get back to sleep. I had a strange dream... This is a funny one.

The dream took place in a REALLY large storage room--more like an enormous warehouse. I was climbing around on these big racks filled with... just the normal shit that people have in their closets and basement storage rooms.

For some inexplicable reason, I was tasked with climbing around these racks, looking through bins and boxes in order to find star wars toys that were once owned by my ex-girl friends, in their youth. You know... action figures of Luke, Darth, Chewie, etc... and related star wars toys like the Death Star, an X-wing Fighter, the Millenium Falcon. My, what a strange mission.

As I climbed around the racks, an ex-girlfriend of mine would magically appear down below me on the warehouse floor and say things like, "No. That wasn't mine. No... Yes. THAT ONE! That's mine. Get that one."

It was understood that I was going to sell the toys on eBay.

As I was climbing around the bins, looking for possibly valuable Storm Trooper action figures, being harangued by ex-girlfriends, I remember thinking to myself "This is ridiculous." "Shit, I'm gonna fall and break my neck." "I'm not a sell-stuff-on-eBay kind of guy." and "Do I have to share the eBay money with her... really?"

WTF?

===============
Dream Exegesis and Hermeneutics
June 13, 2009

I think I know what this dream might be about.... songwriting. The Star Wars action figures are stories or events from past relationships. Climbing around the warehouse is memory / the act of remembering. "Selling it on eBay" is putting that memory or event into a song that I end up playing at gigs, putting on a record, etc. And my concern, "Shit, I'm going to fall and break my neck!", is my ambivalence and mild guilt about the whole process. The girlfriends in the dream are... girlfriends... who say they don't want past events and emotions to appear in a song, but actually, they probably do.

Posted By John Common at: 12:03 am. Add Comment

Thursday, March 12th, 2009

New Record: The Horse Lattitudes

THE DOLDRUMS.
DEATH VALLEY.
4AM.
THE DIFFICULT MIDDLE.
PUEBLO.
DONNER PARTY.

These are all metaphors I've used to describe what inevitably happens during any large scale creative undertaking--the making a record, for instance. It's that barren, dusty, treacherous middle expanse filled with nagging depression and gnawing self-doubt that the Muse or God or Whomever places in our path to test our faith.

It forces us to answer the question, "How badly do I want this?"

As with all of my metaphors, this is just an ineffectual way of trying to convey something that feels complex and nuanced. And it's also a great way to avoid working on my record. But the best metaphor I've found yet for this horrific middle expanse is THE HORSE LATITUDES.

Yes. The Horse Latitudes is a better metaphor--a bettaphor:

Horse Latitudes

Two belts of latitude where winds are light and the weather is hot and dry. They are located mostly over the oceans, at about 30° lat. in each hemisphere, and have a north-south range of about 5° as they follow the seasonal migration of the sun. The horse latitudes are associated with the subtropical anticycline and the large-scale descent of air from high-altitude currents moving toward the poles.

The belt in the Northern Hemisphere is sometimes called the “calms of Cancer” and that in the Southern Hemisphere the “calms of Capricorn.” The term horse latitudes supposedly originates from the days when Spanish sailing vessels transported horses to the West Indies. Ships would often become becalmed in mid-ocean in this latitude, thus severely prolonging the voyage; the resulting water shortages would make it necessary for crews to throw their horses overboard. --The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, 6th ed

My Horse Latitudes: Vocals

Ahh... the myth of tracking vocals live. Every new recording project seems to hold out the hope of nailing a brilliant, live vocal while you're simultaneously nailing a brilliant guitar part or whatever. The theory is a good one: you do this at gigs all the time, so just do it in the studio.

Right.

I'll record live keeper vocals on my record... Right after I win an Oscar for my documentary about a flock of flying unicorns who save a young robot child from a narco-terrorist group in the techno-ghettos of South Boulder.

So yes. I tend to slam into The Horse Latitudes when I'm recording vocals, which usually occurs somewhere between the thrilling flurry of tracking the rhythm section parts and the glorious dilly-dallying of mixing, mastering and designing your cover.

I have been in my Horse Latitudes for the past... several weeks.

The Horse Latitudes: Symptoms

I'll skip the painful and embarassing psychological self-examination (for once) and just describe the symptoms of The Horse Latitudes. Perhaps you've observed them, either personally or with a friend:

• A dry wheezing cough


• Nausea at the sound of one's own voice or/and instrument


• Insomnia and/or sleeping too much


• Loss of appetite and/or eating too much


• Becoming easily irritated or even becoming enraged at small things such as when your drummer innocently asks, "How's the record coming?"


• Constant, bitter cynicism


• Laughing out loud at phrases such as "release date", "mixing" and "when the record's finished..."


• Feelings of worthlessness, hopelessness, listlessness, abandonment and ennui


• Inability to concentrate


• Increased drinking


• Increased smoking


• Finding empty bottles of Jameson in your bed


• Blurry vision


• Lying about your progress... "I got 8 songs done today. Yup. Totally done."


• Extensive, pervasive procrastination -- i.e. multi-slacking


• Persistent negative thoughts


• Inability to sit still


• Harboring thoughts that music is not worth making, or even making elaborate mental plans for how you would quit music (Seek help immediately if this is the case)


• Day dreaming about moving to a tiny coastal town in Maine


• An irrational fear of microphones, preamps, cables and headphones


• Lower back pain, headaches, muscle aches, joint pain, chest pain, digestive problems, exhaustion and fatigue, change in appetite or weight, dizziness, lightheadedness, inordinate Facebookery


• Restless leg syndrome


• Restless arm syndrome


• Restless songwriting syndrome


• Starting a new record to avoid finishing the current record

If you or a friend of yours is experiencing 3 or more of these symptoms during the making of a record or some other large creative endeavor, please know that there is hope. (I'm just saying this because I'm a basically positive person. It's just an assumption at this point.)

In my next entry, I will offer some practical tips for how to extricate oneself from The Horse Latitudes. In the meantime, go throw another horse overboard and stay away from windows.

Posted By John Common at: 12:03 am. Add Comment

Tuesday, March 10th, 2009

Dream: Saltwater Apple River

I had a strange dream this past weekend.

I was personally witnessing a serious family drama with the dynamic of some unknown family. It wasn't my family. I have no idea why I was there or how it was okay that I was witnessing their really hard, harsh, honest conversations with each other.

Posted By John Common at: 12:03 am. Add Comment