Darlene Conner, I'm calling you my Valentine because it's nearly February 14 and you're hella important to me. But I never had a crush on you; I just identified with you deeply (as, I'm sure, did scores of mold-breaking, sarcastic-but-vulnerable, masculine-energied young girls in the 1990s). Some of us were paying closer attention than others.... Continue Reading →
Hades Sets It StraightThey think you shrieked as meadow opened wideand potentilla plunged in the dividefrom which dark stallions launched me up on airto drag you down, who picked the larkspur there.They think you squirmed with loathing on your throne,beseeched me weakly to be left aloneand promptly beat yourself about the head when faced with... Continue Reading →
My holiday project last year was a cover of a song from a seasonal musical that meant a lot to me as a kid. I am really pleased with how that one turned out. I didn’t have any particular ideas for this year… that is, until this past weekend, when a notion started to take... Continue Reading →
A couple years ago I bought a vintage trunk and stored some old accomplishments away in it. I dragged it out today and went through a thick pile of papers from college and grad school. I had saved surviving things from those days indiscriminately. But as I leafed through them today, it seemed clear to... Continue Reading →
Creating has always been a solitary process for me. Truthfully, I envy those folks who are adventurous and mentally unfettered enough to throw innovation spaghetti at the wall alongside other people, and watch the non-viable strands flop unattractively to the floor without a second thought. So I'm ending my string of Wayback Weekends with what... Continue Reading →
Everyone has their own personal legends. On my next Wayback Weekend, I revisit one of mine: the only true 50/50 collab I’ve ever done. https://youtu.be/rHmlEYRssaI
It’s a long weekend so here’s a bonus throwback! This is the furthest back we’ve gone. As a kid I learned to write pop songs by setting classic poetry to music. I think I was barely fifteen when I put this one together. Plus, as followers of this blog already know, I have a thing... Continue Reading →
My high school's production of Christina Rossetti's "Goblin Market" was a bittersweet allegory for all the folderol going on with me at the time (not to mention that our theater department opted for an interpretation that was a veritable pastiche of Bowie's Jareth, Peter Pan's Lost Boys, Robert Smith, A Midsummer Night's Dream, and the... Continue Reading →
This week’s selection is also from high school times, and it’s just a good old song about le desir. By the way, I just decided tonight to call these things “Wayback Weekends,” so I had to go back to all the other ones and update them to look like they’d been called that all along.... Continue Reading →
In 1999 I was 17 and a senior in high school, and I liked to write, uh, moralistic saloon music - ? https://youtu.be/tnIBQp7MHbQ GatesShe with the lipsAnd the prodigal flameWho curses the heavensFrom which she cameMixes her pain And her faith all togetherAnd grinds them to dustOr wraps them in leatherShe who draws heatLike a... Continue Reading →
The Sold Kingdom 