Swing and round about

Posted on 10/05/2015 by admin

So has ‘Out of Town’ succeeded where ‘Firing Squad’ failed? Well the whole notion of virtually placing the listener in peril – ‘you’re facing the firing squad’ is anathema to all forms of jazz. It dealt with controversial subjects aplenty but it did so in third person. Any second person would have been the more typical ‘how could you do me wrong’ variety.

By avoiding topicality, we’re left with a narrative familiar to many traditional structures. It is natural and neutral so there’s not a major stretch to have grouped instruments blasting in unison (in this respect, it has the cheek and irreverence; the upbeat stroll, to suit the cacaphony). No one will mistake it for something that Calloway left in a cab or Miller left in a glen but we are faced always with that dilemma whether to replicate the sentiment of the time in mere pastiche or adapt our own sensibilities and observations to the form.

Can we finish with ragtime, given that bebop is not a lyricist’s medium:

I’m Holding Out

My hands are tied
Around for the ride
I take it in my stride
I'm holding out

The place  has changed
The people estranged
Gone to great pains
to say I'm holding out

My friends already fled
No accounting for the dead
Exhibitions in 
Inhibitions ex
shed 
still I'm holding out

Dicks see land

Posted on 03/05/2015 by admin

For those pupils who are inclined to the view that this is not Dixieland; that it is, in fact, the style of writing I employ on a regular basis, I plead guilty.

This ain’t no Jazz Era number. Let’s keep going. My father was into Swing before he migrated to Australia took to the bush and embraced country. I’m sure I can make a hash of swing just as easily.

Now we don’t want to leaden proceedings by referring to things topical and sombre so let’s think of words worthy of accompanying all those instruments blasting off.

Hitherto I haven’t touched on the discard pile. This is often a scrap of thoughts or partial phrase that sounds promising until you see the blind corner and veer to something different.

Here is one I just experienced:

I move in the circles with Angela Merkel

The idea was to meet the prime requirements of remembering you have people out there on the dancefloor and inject a bit of wayward humour by playing on diplomatic circles and social circles and dance moves into the bargain. But what do I want to say about the German chancellor? She’s a strong sensible leader whom I’ve no wish to mock and she doesn’t have the traits that lend themselves to a metaphoric whirl.

Nor is it necessary to point out to the dance crowd that they are dancing. This happens throughout all styles and eras but it’s not what dominates Swing. It’s more about taking you out and being part of the hip and happenin’ times. There’s a lightness and joviality but you need that in wartime. Screamo is of a later age.

I think, if you are going to light on a clause or phrase that makes good material – still the way I proceed with many poems and songs – then just bear in mind the genre you’re in. It don’t mean a thing if it ain’t got that swing.

Out of Town

I could tell straight away
You were from out of town

Too neat to compete for our streets
far too fey for our gay cafes
Too beautiful too dutiful 
too dashing too smashing
Too altogether  taboo
from our point of view

You must be from out of town

Apart from how artful  you are
we have a fear of those from afar
We're just a sample of the simple way
Still stand strong for those who stay

But you're from out of town

Jazzed about Had Enough

Link

I’ve been pondering this whole question of whether I could write a song that fit the instrumentation of Dixieland, since that seems to be the crux, the trumpet or cornet leads.along with trombone and clarinet.

I don’t know whether I want to engage with the relative subject matter as that way lies madness. They had firing squads at the early part of the twentieth century so it’s fair game.

Firing squad

I must get the musket that goes with that sign
You'll soon find yourselves in the firing line
Even the smallest trifle will bring you in front of those rifles
You're facing a firing squad

You know those guns aren't set to stun
Even the best shots come undone
There's no more scope for hope against dope
Relatives are left to cope
After the firing squad

Jazz o’ sighs

Posted on 18/04/2015 by admin

Before there was the phenomena of rock’n’roll there were various shapes of jazz encompassing full narratives and freeform instrumentals. Not to mention scats.

Sitting in a barber while then oldtime music was playing and I couldn’t help but notice how long the lead in was before Frank Sinatra starts singing. No attempt to barge in and startle the listener.

Lyricists have a licence to work with the structure of jazz in their own manner.

Apart from having heard the jazz standards at some point in my life, I can’t say it’s a field of expertise. To do a faux jazz piece, I’d be inclined to go with a tale that tinges sadness with drama and humour without wasting too many words.

Boom Crash Opera got in decades first with Onion Skin so we’ll have to set out sights elsewhere for subject matter. It doesn’t matter that I have several songs that suit a jazz treatment, we have to practice. I’m not qualified to tackle dixieland with any authority so I’d probably want to ape Miss Otis Regrets or something in that vein.

And no amount of mope eighties Melbourne bands can quell the flow.

Living Large in Liberland

Has your flag started to flag

Have the daze start to drag

You could be living large in Liberland

yeah

A chance to start anew

where the population’s few

and you’ll always have your view

in Liberland

You’re living large in Liberland

Liberland ho

Liberland show

You’re only six k’s long

Yet you’ve got your own song

and nobody else wants that strip

the leader was heard to quip

somehow living large

I tell you living large

in Liberland

Rockin’ Role

Posted on 04/04/2015 by admin

Does this draft conform to rock’n’roll? Or does it have the spirit of rock’n’roll? I’m going to say no to both: yes, it’s got a car and a girl, it deals directly with a relationship that’s taking place right now in the narrative. But it’s not simple; it tries to sneak too many things in and once you start getting layers you’ve moved on from old time rock’n’roll.

With both sexes behind the wheel as evinced by the Beatles’ Baby You Can Drive My Car and Big Black Cadillac with its memorable “she said Balls to you big daddy I ai’n’t never coming back”

There is quirk aplenty in rock’n’roll but you’ll find every novelty number stays assiduously with its premise, be it Monster Mash or Pommy Jackaroo. It’s more of a New Wave (i.e. the stuff that was around at the same time as punk rock) tactic to draw the listener down two different paths, never mind retain a radical indeterminacy. We’re used to these appearing in several of the rock genres but, if the thought had crossed those songwriters’ minds, they would have dismissed this as a distraction, a needless complication.

I’m passing a whole significant history here but it’s because I think the esoteric flights of fancy that rock took in the early seventies were short on the kind of things that occur to The Cars or occur in cars. By the time there were groups called Eddie and the Hot Rods and Racing Cars, the idea of returning to short sharp bursts of song had returned with a vengeance and fast things – like motor vehicles – were good easy topics to write on to fit the frenetic pace.

The Rock’n’Roll Ethos

Posted on 04/04/2015 by admin

We all know that rock’n’roll has its roots in a slang word for sexual congress and originates with so-called race records. What became interesting is the way that this began to be hinted at in a more demure time. The music of rebellion was toe-ing the line.

So Susie’s frantic date tells her to wake up; they’ve fallen asleep at the movies and now their ‘reputation is shot’

Rock’n’roll is simple and lends itself to formula. Neil Sedaka with Calendar Girl springs to mind. Run through the months of the year finding nice things to say about the woman of your affection and you have your song.

The use of proper nouns provides for considerable leeway as you can say what you like about Margaret or Donna or Peggy Sue as long as you keep your story straight.

Rock’n’roll is self-referential; good time music that wants to draw your attention to the fact that you’re dancing, enjoying the performance and the music; you’re getting off on it. For the same reason, there’s numerous references to the dances and dance halls, the clothes everyone was wearing. There’s a fair percentage of songs about cars and girls.

To this day, major rock bands like AC/DC base a part of their large catalogue on rock’n’roll mythologising. But they now span forty years themselves.

Rock’n’roll is a music conceived as youthful differentiation, a celebration of teens from sixty years ago.

There’s little in the way of subterfuge. the Big Bopper tells us he likes Chantilly Lace and explains why. It’s her physical attributes and her movement.

There’s early sledging, like Bo Diddley’s Say Man and speed is celebrated as is action.

She Drove Me

She planted her foot on the accelerator

She said as she led so I’ll see you later

She drove me she drove me drove me

round the bend Where will it end?

She drove me up the wall

Waiting for a way to recall

If I’d ever been this way before

A map of the traps to explore

She drove me she drove me

to distraction gaining traction

From the perspective of the directive

we rode that road so well

that’s the cursive kiss’n’tell

Blues, R’n’B, Rock & Roll

Posted on 22/03/2015 by admin

I maintain that genre is secondary to the writing of the song. If you find yourself with a set of lyrics or complete song that does not fit the mode you originally intended, bonus: you can write in other genres.

Much of the rock variations we listen to now descend from blues via rhythm and blues. Early rock’n’roll is also quite different from the rock music of the ’60s.

While rock has splintered into so many sub and sub-sub genres they resemble grains of sand. There are doubtless audiences now who aren’t aware what the band they’re patronising are classed as nor try to fit their music into one type or another.

It is of no more than curio value, possibly, that rock keeps reaching for ever more precise classification, r’n’b just seems to have broadened or simply leapt to encompass sounds and sensibilities quite different from one another.

Does anyone connect current r’n’b with that of Lee Dorsey?

I’m unlikely to be able to help you with Rihanna and have no interest in going anywhere near Chris Brown but you can see that many of the perennials and universals apply to this tendentious grouping: love, loneliness, job, money and the lack thereof, urban environment (sometimes contrasted with regional)

I think it’s fair to say that rhythm and blues – like blues before it – doesn’t do whimsy. The humour, should it come at all, is in realised situations, not idle fancy.

Nobody Knows My Hometown

Buried away in the back blocks the boondocks
way out the back of beyond
If you're looking to get out of the way
you'll find that's where I'm from

Nobody knows my hometown
They're never going to see it in their lives
Nobody knows my hometown

Not even satellites can capture those distant nights
Nothing but natural light
stare at the only stars to entertain us

Nobody knows no
Nobody knows
Nobody goes 
Nobody shows
my hometown

Nobody knows where I'm from

A pocketful of Poesy

Posted on 04/01/2015 by admin

As you can see from the last post, what I have been saying about different forms holds true: it’s possible to use lines of poetry in song and lines of song for poetry; both examples show that. Why did I cut off down a different path for each then? Well in this case, the poem is concise and doesn’t need embellishment of either further words or of musical backing, while the song has a musicality in its lines that suggests how it might go – it doesn’t sound like something you’d just read out.

As imprecise as this all is, you only need to know what to do to write something that works. If you are going to present something ‘undernourished’, I suggest turning up with some ideas for how the song might go. Otherwise your sketch might be overlooked for something more ‘song-like’

Songpoet’s to be

Posted on 28/12/2014 by admin

I keep reading how song lyrics often don’t carry until they’re performed. The latest to make this claim is Julian Cope in Copendium (Tim bought it for me for my birthday) and he’s no slouch.

If this were not so, the whole term ‘songpoet’ would be meaningless. If David Lee Roth was a poet by virtue of singing songs then there’d be no grounds for singling out Jacques Brel. It is true that songs have different dictates to poems; that poetry does not always cede to song.

As our beloved Leonard turns eighty we remind ourselves that he was a published poet before he picked up the guitar.

So what is the difference between poetry and song? If some song lyrics now have more of a layout of a poem because they don’t follow the verse chorus verse pattern, does that makes them cross territories?

Instead of trying to see whether ‘No man is an island’ fits into a song or any of the songs with ‘perfect’ in them would be just as perfect in poetic form, let’s cut from whole cloth.

The biggest news in Sydney when I was working there (I still work there but am on Christmas break) was the siege. Now I don’t want to cover that, for a number of reasons, but we have the word and an associated phrase that makes good material for both a song and a poem.

First the poem

Siege Mentality

You resent the sentiment

as you close off all contacts

keep sharp objects hidden

behaviour guarded

I will be the first to confess that that has the makings of a song verse. Sometimes a set of words can do double duty. As long as you don’t confuse the two absolutely.

I sweat and I swoon

Will it all be over soon

I’ve got a siege mentality

I’m distressed and distraught

Afraid of being caught

With my siege mentality

Siege mentality

I’ve assumed as I’m ashamed

In the bloom of taken blame

For this siege mentality

[fade repeat]

What makes them different

Posted on 12/11/2014 by admin

Say you are writing a piece called Cull and you want it to canvas the subject of culling. If you write an essay or assignment, you would have data and references that supported an argument of how much culling already takes place, whether bear culls or kangaroo culls compare with shark culls. In order to construct any kind of case you want facts and figures and careful comparisons.

The song and poem are at considerably more liberty and they do share this with the prose sketch.

Cull

You can see where we’ve taken them out; the last remnants of co-opted habitat. It’s because of the big teeth or the aggression, mixed in with unpredictability. There’s all kinds of primal fears driving our impulse to strike first. Or react to one death inflicted by their kind with many slaughters of our own.

Even a magazine article would find some appeal to authority necessary. This form has no such requirement.

Neither does song

Cull

Be they red of tooth and claw

As long as there’s a law

We can cut their numbers

Be they large or plentiful

Spare the rare and beautiful

From the cull

Accidents happen when you’re out to see

A part of the forest you can run free