------------------------------------------------------------------------ Subject: Re: [LAU] Any lyrics please? From: Frank Pirrone <frankpirrone(a)gmail.com> Date: Tue, 25 Sep 2007 16:16:13 -0400 To: julien lociuro <julien.lociuro(a)gmail.com> To: julien lociuro <julien.lociuro(a)gmail.com> julien lociuro wrote: Yeah, that's pretty much it Julien. I mean, you can't string lyrics, poetry, or prose together without a story or scenario in mind. So, I sat there for a moment and thought I'd take the easy way out and use the general image of a "relationship" as the context. Then I thought about what kind of images I might draw from - and I'll close with a few examples both to make a point and maybe serve as a starting point - and began to feel the struggles and sometimes common yet other times divergent paths a relationship takes. Think about the less corny ones. First one that just popped into my mind, and for some personal reasons, was "It's Too Late Baby" by Carole King. Long time ago - early 70s. Here's the essence of the death of a relationship due to nothing more than its running a commonly seen course. One person gets in deeper while the other drifts away. In the process awkwardness and pain grow until it's got to end...now. Anyway, I thought of an image I've had before, in a number of contexts - including technology training where expertise radiates out from a core of folks inseminated with ideas and skills until it reaches and affects everyone in the situation. With this concentric circles metaphor, something happens to start thoughts or events into motion - that motive pebble (a kind of strange term that I've never used or thought of before but again I kept to be true to the process and 'cause I sort of liked it). Here's a concrete example: Troubled relationship, woman goes off on a vacation, meets someone but nothing more than that at first, returns, mentions it to man - maybe just to be open an honest, maybe to give him that fateful clue, the ripples of this encounter eventually impact everything between them and in their hearts until it's...too late baby. The bit about the impulse coming from the depths of what was sought is something of a cheat for meter and rhyme, but fundamentally a coherent piece of the story. Something tiny, from deep feelings, deep fears, or even the subconscious can in a moment assert itself - something calls it up or sets it off. Here's a concrete example of that: Couple in a troubled relationship are at an amusement park, and something happens - he does it or she does it - and suddenly an awareness occurs or concretizes resulting in those fateful ripples. Maybe the ball toss to win a stuffed bear reminds one of them about an earlier relationship, and this recollection changes the perception of the current relationship leading to that too late baby moment. Yikes! I've never actually intellectualized all this before, but it's a very interesting question - what is a mechanism for the creative process. I've always considered myself a problem solver and a creative person - music, computers, programming, committee work, so at least for myself I could if not a book then write a short pamphlet on how it works. Please excuse any appearance of pretentiousness here. I'm just trying to offer whatever help I can. My comments will be beneath those who've gone farther but may be helpful to those who haven't gone as far. Finally, some other images relating to thoughts, feelings, philosophy: We're such social beings, but so imprisoned within ourselves. Like islands, but surrounded by our boundaries instead of water. You can never know what I mean when I say I love watermelon, and can never know how a m7b5 chord makes me feel, or exactly what kind of buzz I get from a perfectly formed piece of code. We can never get closer than bumping together (not us guys Julien...I'm thinking of some of the lovely young things at school) or maybe a little physically "closer" during sex - nothing crude intended - but, no matter how desperately I want to crawl inside the very essence and being and mind of someone I love...I can't. What we have is grossly limited language and nuance, gestures and touching. However, everything, every damned thing is translated by the other - filtered through her experience and consciousness and perception. Or as the Animals once said, "Oh Lord, please don't let me be misunderstood." Actually, once before I'm off this mortal coil, I'd love to be UNDERSTOOD. So, were islands, close sometimes but separated, demarked and delineated by many degrees of isolation - gender, age, experiences, personality, intellect, soul and spirit. If only our essence (whatever in hell that would be) could drift outside ourselves and literally merge so that we could truly, oh god I'm going to type this..., grok each other. Her eyes become my eyes, and her fingertips one with mine. I can feel cosmic by meditating, or ingesting certain natural and man-made substances, but for all the times I've called out to someone with only thoughts, I've never heard an answer. Whew...spooky shit. I've got to grab a couple Popsicles and the Newsweek that just came and go outside and hit the pool - set a record today here in Western New York following a glorious week and a half in turn following a positively glorious Summer. Anyway, Julien, if you're still reading down this far, and anyone else who's been thinking through this stuff - if you can't write a song out of all that crap, I have truly failed! Frank