The second Reading List comprises reading choices by my friend, at times co-songwriter, and fellow avid reader Francisco Silva. Francisco laid to rest his old (pun intended) music composition Old Jerusalem and has been taking off in new directions with The June Carriers and Velho Homem. In Francisco’s own words.
Some of my musical reading material… :
Warren Ellis – Nina Simone’s Gum: A Memoir of Things Lost and Found is a picaresque story of the amulet engendered by Warren Ellis as an excuse to digress about music, creativity, humanity, etc.
Whyndam Wallace – Lee, Myself & I: Inside The Very Special World Of Lee Hazlewood is Lee Hazlewood’s life story as retold by his former manager, journalist Wyndham Wallace.
Bruce Adams – You’re With Stupid, the Chicago scene and the Kranky label by the quill of one of its founders, Bruce Adams.
Various – Rock Rendez Vous the photos of the iconic Lisbon club (and the portrait of an era).Rob Young – Electric Eden a detailed and multifaceted story of British folk music and its context.
Harold F. Eggers – My years with Townes van Zandt: Music, Genius and Rage” – the uncanny account of Harold F. Eggers’ time as road manager to Townes van Zandt in his prime and beyond it – an assignment that only a Vietnam veteran could tackle.
Ian Preece – Listening to the Wind: Encounters with 21st Century Independent Record Labels. Interviews and profiling of some of the most interesting (obscure?) independent record labels of our time: Light In The Attic, Thrill Jockey, International Anthem, Touch, Sublime Frequencies, Temporary Residence, Important, Paradise of Bachelors, Scissor Tail, among others.
… and two extraordinary graphic novels: the hitherto rare Storyville by Frank Santoro and the amazing Rusty Brown (but it could also be the just as beautiful – if not more so – Jimmy Corrigan) by Chris Ware.
A little over one year ago my friend Dana suggested me Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way. I have now been writing The Morning Pages, an integral part of the book that is meant to be carried on.
Dana recommending me The Artist’s Way wasn’t so much because I was artistically blocked. I was composing, playing, painting, writing poems and more at the time. More because I wasn’t going to physical places I wanted to go. My feet, my body, seemed glued. In early 2022 I was invited by a friend to go and spend time with him. I truly wanted to, but couldn’t move.
Maybe summer (2022) would be it. It wasn’t. Summer 2022 brought a big musical piece, appeared literally when I woke up, name, concept, the names of several tracks all there. I turned my laptop on, opened Audacity and start cresting the sounds that, for me, translated the names of the tracks.
Out of the blue, as a coincidence, that Julia Cameron just like my friend Ed call synchronicity, Francisco (Silva – The June Carriers/Velho Homem/Old Jerusalem) start sending small guitar lines for me to hear the sound of his new guitar, an electric one (in Old Jerusalem life, Francisco was known for playing acoustic). He didn’t knew I was composing, I didn’t knew he had the Mustang. “What if I put some of those guitar lines on my tracks?” And so I did and what was electronic start become, and end up, electro-acoustic.
That same summer another friend turned 50. Until the eve of his birthday I didn’t knew he played (guitar), he didn’t knew I played (bass). There was going to be a band in which he was playing covers. I said I would go and play bass. And I did. I had played with them before, had never played on stage, hadn’t played bass in about 18.5 years until a few months before, no rehearsal. Just get there, they were already playing when I arrived, pick the house bass and go for it. It was great.
A few days later I was at the jams that were held at the place of the birthday party. This time, it was tricky to get the house bass. A woman playing electric? Seems not (it turned out is wasn’t just a woman playing electric, but not being from the proper musical background. I stayed there, observing, until I spotted an approachable musician, a saxophonist. We both played together, by the end of the jam. Total improv. He would wonderfully fit the saxophone wherever it was required. The next week he brough a jazz guitarist that gave me four 7th arpeggios to practice to play with them one week later. And so it was.And then it stopped. But I got a fabulous saxophonist for my music I didn’t even knew I needed. That summer I also started painting on canvas.
I didn’t went to stay with my friend. Autumn, Winter came. I didn’t went to go see my friend. It’s 2023. I want to go see someone play abroad. My feet remain glued. Dana, aware of what has been written so far and more, told me about The Artist’s Way. I read it, did all the exercises – some may, at first glance seem silly and childish, but aren’t – begin writing The Morning Pages.
I start venturing into short distance travels by train. Stayed overnight with a recent acquaintance. And with a different friend for a few weeks, carrying a ton of notebooks, my guitar, the digital copy of The Artists Way. It was the first time I spend a number of weeks with an electric guitar as my only instrument. It was a thrill.
Over two years since he invited me, I still haven’t went to see the friend that asked over in early 2022 – there is a little more to the story than my feet being glued the floor. As in, my feet were glued to the floor, but something else, my heart, was glued too. Under his shyness, my friend is adventurous, passionate, intense, larger than life, has deep emotions, loves love, passion and life. I share some of those things, but don’t deal well with deep, bubbling emotions. Open my heart again? Run the risk of heartbreak? Probably not. One day it will (re)happen.
But The Morning Pages have been there for me, so has he who keeps telling me to write for others to read. I write a lot on my journal(s), notebooks, The Morning Pages, to him.
I’ve recommended The Artist’s Way to a few people. Some already read it, did the exercises and wrote The Morning Pages for a while. Others bought the book and are still to read it, do the exercises and immerse themselves in The Morning Pages. My Morning Pages aren’t always in the morning, but I’ve been writing the three pages everyday. Matt, another friend, thinks it is quite the commitment to be writing The Morning Pages for a year.
Early this year I went to a vero circuit/guitar pedal building wokshop. A nice distortion/fuzz pedal both for guitar and bass was build. The last time I had soldered I was 13 or 14. Afterwards, home, I painted and customized the pedal box. Some of the materials, like the sparkling dust and the stars were part of a number of things from The Artist’s Way exercises. The rest is acrylic paint and glossy nail varnish and coat.
I’ve recently become a member of Grupo Operário do Ruído (Workers Noise Group) an ensemble of noise(s) and rhythm from Sonoscopia that will have its public presentation December 8th at Conservatório de Música do Porto. We have a staggering amount of rehearsals and a few workshops. Grupo Operário do Ruído is far less leftfield for me than what can be called life narration writing. To an extent I do that with my poems, but it is very different. I’ve also taken a short trip by metro to the seaside north of Porto that included seeing a small intimate concert friends had put up.
In fairness, I move across very different social groups. So much so that now Beatriz, one of my fellow members of Grupo Operário do Ruído (GOR) asked if her fellow GOR members would be interested in being part of her group of guests in a performance she is part of called Sonópolis. Sonópolis is to be presented at Sala Suggia, the orchestra room, at Casa da Música, July 7th. I’m in!
Old Jerusalem – Breeding angels – drawing by Francisco Silva
My Amazing Songs & Other Delights #63 – The Say Hello, Wave Goodbye edition is tomorrow Monday, 8th, 3-4pm (gmt+1) on Yé Yé Radio: yeyeradio.com (or on the app).
The title comes from the Soft Cell song of the same name, here on a cover by David Gray. The meaning refers to saying hello to something new, goodbye to an old, beloved one. In this case, the old beloved one is Old Jerusalem that Francisco Silva is retiring with a last concert on the 20th, at Socorro here in Porto. Old Jerusalem’s farewell includes Breeding angels, a demos album that contains Red sun over the interstate – that is also on this week’s programme – a song I have the previledge of known, and often sing on my own home, for a couple of years.
If Francisco is retiring Old Jerusalem, he is bringing, given birth, to The June Carriers that release their debut album Equanimity on the 10th. And now, beginnings and endings, and metting, and journeys, and the same thing, that yet is, but isn’t, become even more interesting.
My track Big Bang, that opens the show, has the exact same guitar line as The June Carriers’s Pastoral Epigraph, that closes the show. It is a travel from the The Big Bang, from the ends, or beginnings, of The Universe to Earth. The guitar, of course, is played be Francisco on both instrumentals. As for the why and how Francisco’s guitar line ended up on my track, on both tracks, that is for another day.
What my Big Bang and Then June Carriers’ Pastoral Epigraph shows is how the exact same guitar line, although easily recognisable, can feel so different depending of its surrounding, of the musical ambience and creation. Of how two people compose differently with the same guitar line (or any other same musical bit). Other than knowing I was going to use his guitar line, Francisco had no say, nor knew, what I was going to do with it. I didn’t have a clue how he was going to use it on what become The June Carriers’ first album.
My 16 choices for this The Say Hello, Wave Goodbye edition are all about travel, journeys, inner and outer, out in space, on our planet, far from home, standing still. The Modern Lovers’ Dodge Veg o-matic is probably the best going nowhere song ever. Bartleby, the immovable, “I prefer not to” scrivener of Henry Melville’s tale as his very fixed ideais regarding is life, his views, doing, moving, changing in ways others find normal is not for him.
Some journeys don’t end well. Like in the Erlkönig a Schubert lieder, with lyrics by Goethe, in which a father rides madly through the night, on horseback, with his son, whistle the Erlking is enticing the child, that tries to draw dad’s attention. The lieder ends with the blunt “In seinen Armen das Kind war tod” (roughly “in your arms the child is dead”.
Others have twist and turns. Diferentes in perspective, depending where we find ourselves. My photos of the maze from my favourite local park are taken from inside it and I know my way around it because I know from where the whole maze can be seen. However, on a foggy day, I may, and still get lost in it. The colour and black and photo illustrate the same thing seen in two different ways.
Tracklist: 01 – Raquel Pinheiro – Big Bang (radio edit) 02 – Old Jerusalem – Red sun over the interstate 03 – Franz Schubert – Erlkönig (Op. 1, D. 328 – Wer reitet so spät sung by Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau) 04 – The Modern Lovers – Dodge Veg o-matic 05 – Bernard Butler – Camber Sands 06 – The Fugs – Bartleby The Scrivener 07 – Elton John – Goodbye Yellow Brick Road 08 – David Gray – Say Hello, Wave Goodbye (Soft Cell cover) 09 – The Beatles – Drive My Car 10 – The Clash – Lost In The Supermarket 11 – Kings of Leon – Going Nowhere (live in Nashville) 12 – Siouxie & The Banshees – The Passenger (Iggy Pop cover) 13 – The Proclaimers – I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles) (2011 remaster) 14 – Aaron Copland – Going to Heaven! (Emily Dickinson poem, sung by Sanford Sylvan) 15 – Little Eve – The Loco-Motion (remaster) 16 – The June Carriers – Pastoral Epigraph
Mondo Bizarre Magazine 