Tag Archives: Marvin

Usual Rubbish

Stupid homework.

Aw, do I really have to come in now? Gosh dang it. I don’t want to do my homework. I want to STAY OUTSIDE AND PLAY. I want to SPEAK IN CAPITAL LETTERS.

Oh, hi. I was just undergoing some cheap psychiatry. I think it’s called regression analysis … or something like that. Here’s how it goes: you close your eyes and imagine you’re Brett Kavanaugh … I mean, a 7-year-old while Marvin (my personal robot assistant) plays 8-track tapes of Peter Frampton. Yes, it hurts, but sometimes the truth does hurt.  And this is about getting to the truth, right Marvin? Marvin? Marvin! Turn down the 8-track player … I’m asking you a question.

Why are we doing this, just a few days from Columbus Day? Random chance. And we don’t celebrate Columbus Day, so even more random. Actually, one of our neighbors said I should have my head examined. It took me a while to work out precisely what he meant by that. (Long enough, in fact, for Mitch Macaphee to stick my head under an electron microscope.) The neighbor took exception to our kind of loud rehearsals, our strange plantings around the front entrance, and the occasional explosions emanating from Mitch’s subterranean lab.

This is HOGWASH.What was the results of my regression analysis? Well, it looks like I should have put more effort into eliminating relationships between variables. And I should have kept my focus on the relationship between a dependent variable and one or more independent variables. It’s all about co-dependency, you see? You don’t? Right. Neither do I. And apparently my rent-a-shrink is actually a statistician by trade. I don’t understand a word he says, mostly because he just talks so fast, but partly because his comments are so unbearably dull I just can’t keep my eyes open. And you’re not supposed to fall asleep on that stereotypical therapy couch, but I did. So maybe I’m on TV, now.

I hate to seem arrogant, but psychiatry is kind of lost on me. At least the robot-based variety. If someone comes up with a method of therapy that doesn’t involve robots, let me know.

Usual Rubbish

Strange gravity.

I don’t know, man. That song seems kind of dark. Dark, but in a happy way. Yeah … that’s the way we do it around here, am I right? No … that was a rhetorical question. Never mind.

Oh, hello. It’s your old pal Bozo. I mean, Joe-zo. (That might have been my clown name if I had chosen another, slightly divergent path in life, but I digress.) Having a little band meeting here. Joe? Present. Matt? Present. Marvin (my personal robot assistant)? Present, to the extent that an automaton can ever be TRULY present, but setting philosophical questions aside … Mitch Macaphee? Not present. Actually, in truth it’s just me and Matt, and the topic is songwriting.

It goes like this. He’s got songs, I’ve got songs … all God’s children got songs. That said, they’re all based on subject matter that’s, well, a little dark. Dark matter, if you will. Now, it’s not surprising that we would use the stuff that makes up the bulk of the universe as the substance of our songs. You never lack for material.  Even so, songwriting can be a lot like pulling teeth … except the pay isn’t nearly as good. And either way you go, somebody ends up toothless. A tooth for a tooth, an eye for an eye. Aye aye, sir.

I don't see any dark matter. Oh ... right.Well, I’ve wandered a bit. But the point I’m trying to get to is this: we tend to write happy little songs about big nasty things. This month we appear to be back on the fascist beat again. Next month, who knows? Some other grave subject matter that can be turned into a nursery rhyme or a mambo. That’s the way it works round these parts. Those are our principles. And if you don’t like them … we have other principles. (Yes, I’m a Marxist. My favorite is Groucho, but it’s not a strong preference.)

Speaking of work, it has been nearly forever since our last THIS IS BIG GREEN podcast. I just want to assure our five listeners that, yes, we will post more episodes this fall and, yes, they will be ridiculous. It’s been a busy year, folks. I’d explain why, but I’ve got too much to do right now. Excuses, excuses, right? Sheesh.

Usual Rubbish

Strum and dang.

Let’s see …. how does the barre system go again? Oh, right. It’s freaking impossible. Forgot that part. Back to the banjo chords then. I wonder how good songwriters handle questions like this.

Yes, if you haven’t already guessed, I’m attempting to write some songs this week. Well, I should say one song, but that’s being somewhat generous. I can’t let Matt carry the entire burden of composing for Big Green. What kind of brother would that make me? I’ll tell you what kind. My kind, that’s what. Just STAY OUT OF IT. Anyway … that’s why I’m handling this guitar. Notice I didn’t say “playing”. That’s a bridge too far … and this song of mine doesn’t even have a bridge.

Frankly, I don’t see how Matt does it. He dreams up these songs, harmonizes them in about twenty minutes down in the basement of the Cheney Hammer Mill, then tracks the suckers. Me? I get some lame idea, knock it around in my head for a couple of days, and then either the lyrics come all at once or they drop from the sky in fragments, sometimes six months, sometimes a year apart. In some instances I do songwriting at a glacial pace. You can actually watch me evolve during the course of writing a single song. (When I wrote the first verse, I was an Australopithecus. Now look at me! Definitely Peking man.}

Okay, hit "record" or whatever.So, if I’m treating every songwriting project like the evolutionary ascent of man, that amounts to a lot of banjo-plucking primates. And that’s where many of my songs start out. I’ll find a chair somewhere in this big old barn of a place, throw my cheap-seat Martin D-1 across my leg and start playing the five chords I know best. If I stumble upon some progression or melody worth repeating, I can’t rely on memory alone. Fortunately, Marvin (my personal robot assistant) has an audio recording module, and if I can get him to stand still long enough, I can capture whatever the hell it is I’m working on and play it back later. If it happens in the middle of the night,  the playback sounds like …. you guessed it …. banjo-plucking primates.

Hey, we all have our process. That’s what makes us human, right? Doing dumb shit, then figuring out how to improve on a bad thing. That’s the Big Green way.