Morning visitor

The bright chill of Autumn visited us this morning, like a seasonal guest you see only at holidays, only hers is Halloween, not Christmas. We greeted our guest by curling up in bed naked, ménage à trois, naughty for making us late to work.

shard

Full moon in the day sky

Just a phrase stuck in my head

next song

Well, I shouldn't call it a song, 'cause I can't write music. But I'm musing about my next lyrics. Very different tone than "Hold on Real Tight." The embryonic form:

No you don't really know me
And you don't really care
'Cause I drive an expensive car
And I've got executive hair
You know I can provide what's needed
If I'm lacking what is nice
something something leads into

I'll be the sun in your eyes when you're driving
The popcorn between your teeth
The rain on your car when you've washed it
Your TV when you've lost the remote

.
.
.

But I've got the sperm and the cash
He's got it

For the chorus I'm hearing a kind of call-and-response with a female chorus.

I have to give Jae credit for the phrase, "the sperm and the cash."

Hold on Real Tight V -- for singing

I think I've got it.

There's water in the canyons
And rain up in the hills
There's a rushing in the rivers
And lovers stranded up at the old mill

Wrap your arms around your baby
Hold on real tight
Ward against the Devil's laughter
And the witching light

There's a wind in the willows
And the sun gutters like a torch
Shadows race across the prairie
And silouettes watch from the porch
There's rain on the tin roof
And the creaking of the swing
Two bodies warm the chill evening
Water in the gutter sings

Wrap your arms around your baby
Hold on real tight
Ward against the Devil's laughter
And the witching light

The old mill leaks like a sieve
And the roads are turned to mud
Wet hair hangs in her eyes
And rain pounds in your ears like blood

Wrap your arms around your baby
Hold on real tight
Ward against the Devil's laughter
Beware the thief in the night

There's water in the canyons
And rain up in the hills
There's a rushing in the rivers
And lovers stranded up at the old mill

Wrap your arms around your baby
Hold on real tight
Ward against the Devil's laughter
And the witching light

Repeat refrain

Amusing myself

Things I've said today that amuse me.

5 minutes to virtue

The boiled brussell sprouts of my youth

Hold on Real Tight IV -- Chorus

I got some feedback from others, and it confirmed some of my own concerns. The lack of a chorus was questioned. I was questioning it myself. Just unsure. Plus the 3rd verse was no one's favorite, and I wasn't comfortable with it. I decided, for grins, to try a version with a more traditional verse/chorus structure. One of the things that meant was lengthening the original verses. I came up with this.

There's water in the canyons
And rain up in the hills
There's a rushing in the rivers
And lovers stranded up at the old mill
The old mill leaks like a sieve
And the roads are turned to mud
Wet hair hangs in her eyes
And rain pounds in your ears like blood

Wrap your arms around your baby
Hold on real tight
Ward against the Devil's laughter
And the witching light

There's a wind in the willows
And the sun gutters like a torch
Shadows race across the prairie
And silouettes watch from the porch
There's rain on the tin roof
And the creaking of the swing
She holds your hand like last hope
Water in the gutter sings

Wrap your arms around your baby
Hold on real tight
Ward against the Devil's laughter
And the witching light


Then I was stuck. Does it need another verse?

Hold on Real Tight III

I struggled to come up with the 3rd verse. At this point I had established this pattern of changing setting. The ocean shore seemed like a good, broad kind of place, but I'm not familiar with it, so I don't have a feel for the crucial details. Here's what I came up with.

There's water in the canyons
And rain up in the hills
There's a rushing in the rivers
And lovers stranded up at the old mill
Wrap your arms around your baby
Hold on real tight
Ward against the Devil's laughter
And the witching light

There's a wind in the willows
And the sun gutters like a torch
Shadows race across the prairie
And silouettes watch from the porch
Wrap your arms around your baby
Hold on real tight
Feel the coolness of the evening
And the warmth in the night

There's waves crashing on the shoreline
And rain blowing in through the screen
The surf roars in furious abandon
And lovers rock with no distance between
Wrap your arms around your baby
Hold on real tight
Slide along the surface of everything
Till you plunge into the night


At this point I was starting to struggle with coming with new variations for the last 2 lines of each verse. I also started to question the structure of the lyrics, namely the lack of a traditional verse/chorus.

Unrelated fragment

Sometime around the time I wrote the second verse for Hold On Real Tight, I scribbled this fragment on an adjacent page in the sketchbook. It's a little trite, but might be a good starting point.

A man's heart is a vessell
That holds just one day
24 hours of spinning
Part labour and part sinning
Some dark and some light
Part day and part night

Hold on Real Tight II

Little while ago, Jae gave me an annotated sketchbook she'd never gotten around to using. It's a hardback sketchbook with, of course, empty pages for sketching on. The annotated part is that about the bottom quarter of the page is lined like notebook paper. Sketch on top, notes on bottom. I thought it was a neat idea, and Jae gave it to me. That's where I'm writing this stuff down.

I think it was about a week later that I scribbled the first verse and then this second one into the sketchbook. I believe I was sitting on the back porch. At that point, here's what I had.

There's water in the canyons
And rain up in the hills
There's a rushing in the rivers
And lovers stranded up at the old mill
Wrap your arms around your baby
Hold on real tight
Ward against the Devil's laughter
And the witching light

There's a wind in the willows
And the sun gutters like a torch
Shadows race across the prairie
And silouettes watch from the porch
Wrap your arms around your baby
Hold on real tight
Feel the coolness of the evening
And the warmth in the night

I expanded on a theme and mood, but varying what you might call the setting.

Hold on Real Tight

This might be silly, but it seems like the silly kind of thing blogs are for.

I'm making my first real attempt at writing what I hope could be song lyrics. I say hope, because I don't get the music part. I'm OK with words, but I don't understand their relationship to music. Anyway, I'm playing around with it, having a lot of fun, and I thought I'd record the evolution of things here.

I was inspired by a newly discovered song writer that Luke introduced me to. The artist is Jeffrey Foucault. One of the ways you learn a craft is to emulate the work of someone whose work you admire. I had been listening to the Foucault and I did this unintentionally, at first. I was hiking in the mountains and I composed this in my head while walking. It's the beginning of my first attempt at a song, and afterwards I noticed the unconscious influence of the the other writer.


There's water in the canyons
And rain up in the hills
There's a rushing in the rivers
And lovers stranded up at the old mill
Wrap your arms around your baby
Hold on real tight
Ward against the Devil's laughter
And the witching light


So there it is. This is the first post in a series about how this progresses.