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Podcast

THIS IS BIG GREEN: June 2018

Audio

Big Green returns after a 5 month hiatus with a powerhouse marathon edition of TIBG, featuring another musical episode of Ned Trek, eight brand new songs, a little crazy talk, some crazier singing, and much more. We’re back, baby!

This is Big Green – June 2018. Features: 1) Ned Trek 37: Return to the Carl; 2) Song: Light Thing, by Big Green; 3) Song: Sagan’s Song, by Big Green; 4) Song: Risk Is Your Business, by Big Green; 5) Song: Congratulations, by Big Green; 6) Song: Teller, by Big Green; 7) Song: The Other Side, by Big Green; 8) Song: Fat Captain, by Big Green; 9) Song: Blow The Man Down, by Big Green; 10) Put the phone down: an impromptu rendition of All Saints Come, by Big Green; 11) The songs, explained; 12) Dueling imitations of famous people; 13) Falcon watch update: Monday is Monkey Day; 14) A visit with Bernie Jetson; 15) Thelonius Ingraham and the Hand; 16) Stupit talk: growing down; 17) Time to go.

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Usual Rubbish

Going up.

What the hell’s that sound? The street sweepers again? Probably a lawn mower. Lawn mowing! What the hell is this neighborhood coming to?

Well, here I am, down in the basement of the Cheney Hammer Mill, tapping away at my keyboard as I often do this time of week. Strange how you can hear everything that’s going on outside from down here. Of course, there are probably mouse holes in this place you can drive a front-loader through. Though I have to admit – I myself have never seen a mouse drive a front-loader. It would be one way to defend themselves from those awful snap traps. Diabolical contraptions!

Anyway, summer has kind of arrived here in upstate New York, now that we’re on the climate change calendar, so naturally my mind turns to more leisurely pursuits. I know what you’re thinking – what on Earth could be more leisurely than being a member of a band that never plays anywhere? Well, you might be surprised by my response to that question. I find all kinds of pointless uses for my time. My illustrious brother Matt, not so much – always doing things, that one. Me? My natural state is at rest. And while I spend most of the year going up the stairs, in the summer I go down them.

This thing's friggin' WRECKED!My summer pass-times usually include deep archive stuff – you know, threading old reel-to-reel tapes onto antiquated and dysfunctional playback machines, just to get a momentary listen in to what they contain. We have a few of those, and many, many audio cassettes with both stereo and four-track content. We also have Hi-8 DAT tapes from our Tascam DA-88 days (the system we used to record our first album, 2000 Years To Christmas) and, of course, standard DAT cassettes. I’m guessing that if you add it all up, it would amount to less content than we’ve produced in just the last five years, but it may be close. Matt did a lot of recordings in the 80s and 90s – probably hundreds of original songs.

Oh, then of course there’s our podcast, THIS IS BIG GREEN. My guess is that we will be posting the next episode in just a few days,  but I’m terrible at predicting things, so I won’t say anything. Beyond what I just said. Arrgghh … I’m no good at this. Should probably be mowing the lawn.

Usual Rubbish

Inside December/January.

Did you toss it up there? Good. High enough for everyone to reach, I hope. Sometimes you have to warm the arm up a bit, like the old windmill baseball pitch, then let it fly, and hopefully it lands right in the sweet spot. That’s pretty much all you can do. Server technology is tricky as hell.

Oh, hi. As you may or may not know, we posted our Holiday/New Year episode of our podcast, THIS IS BIG GREEN, this past week, and already it’s generating serious buzz. No, seriously … I try to listen to it, and all I get is a buzz. (I’m told that’s my ear buds.) Now, if YOU listen to it, you’re likely to hear the following:

NED TREK 35: The Romney Christmas Special / Ned Trek Reunion Special. Well, we tried to make an extravaganza this year, and obviously failed. Then we tried to get the lousy show up in time for Christmas, and, again, we failed. However, it has been posted in time for New Year’s, and this special Ned Trek is certainly worthy of a holiday as nondescript as New Year’s. The intention was to put together something that resembles one of those lame reunion specials for The Brady Bunch or The Manson Family (hint: one of those is fake), including some unknown hireling actor playing Jan (or in our case, playing Perle). Also featured is Jimmy Sweetwater, the guy inside the Nixon robot (not the voice actor). The “special” is variously hosted by Gladston Goodstein (aka Peter Lorre), Dr. Carl Sagan, and Lee Majors.

Embedded in the show are six Big Green songs, including:

Romney Christmas Special Theme Song – A ludicrous little number featuring Nixon, Kissinger, actual Perle, Ned, Willard and other voices. Covers some of the thematic underpinnings of this failed adventure in audio entertainment.

Christmas Business – Another Willard number capturing the true confiscatory spirit of the holidays. Refreshingly brief.

Sorry, man. You're not needed this year.Plastic Head – This song is a slight redo of a number Matt did for his 1988 Christmas tape, this version sung by Ned. All about a vehicular encounter with a roadside Christmas miracle coupled with metaphysical transposition. Just listen – you’ll get it.

Bobby Sweet – A new song, roughly about America’s gun culture. At Christmas.

Christmas To End – This is another retread of a song Matt wrote for one of his gift tapes, this one from 1994, re-recorded as a Sulu song. Let the war on Christmas begin … again.

He Does It For Spite – Re-recording of a song from Matt’s legendary 1990 Christmas tape, about a spoiler spirit from the great beyond. True story.

PUT THE PHONE DOWN. Matt and I talk about … uh … I don’t know what. We do bad accents, talk about beavers, sing weird songs, and generally make merry by the standards of this dark time. Hope you enjoy listening to it as much as we enjoyed making it. (And hopefully a whole lot more.)