the days of the dark clouds

not that it’s all been thunder & rain clouds lately (actually it’s been quite good), but the subject line conveys my feelings on the last 4 months or so. adding to the feeling:

just got back from the cardiologist. despite my better efforts in the exercise and supplement department (didn’t really give my best effort on the diet front), my cholesterol went UP compared to the numbers from the first of the year.

so i now i have a prescription for crestor, an appointment in june, and a sour attitude. luckily, i’ll get to work out a little agression tonite playing hockey. assuming that it doesn’t rain and that the lavergne parks folks were able to get the rink resurfaced in time (some jacknut skateboarders waxed down the entire inline rink, making it unusable).

stupid genetics…

revealing the weapon

i figure, what with all the talk of me killing myself lyrically (definitely not literally. life’s good in the dominey household kids.) i should post the song where i off myself. i haven’t worked out a title yet, and frankly, i still might change the chorus, but it’s close enough to show. here ’tis:

he had seven good years of company stock
lost a little bit of soul every time that he punched the clock
he didn’t wanna sell nothin’, he just took what he found
the day his mother died early and the big balloon hit the ground
he found a pretty girl that he wanted around
said, “i ain’t much of nothin’ but i won’t ever let you down”

and if it takes all my life
i’m gonna find that peace of mind
in my arms
i may wind up gone
but i’m on the right path

he lived his whole damn life in the space that he’d find
between five o’clock friday and late on sunday nite
but he dreamed every nite of the things that he’d seen
in the travel advertisements of the grocery store magazines
and he found the pretty girl and he took her by the hand
said, “i ain’t seen nothin’, and i hope you understand”

and if it takes all my life
i’m gonna find that peace of mind
in my arms
i may wind up gone
but i’m on the right path

he punched in every morning, punched out after dark
gave ‘em thirty good years, got a gold watch for his part
but he never lost the feeling of running away
it ate at him more & more every nite and day
she found it in a note that was laying by his hand
said, “i took care of the money and i hope you understand.”

(that’s the end, there is no last chorus. the character’s dead, so the song’s done.)

last nite i killed myself

it seems rude to have a private conversation in a public place, so i’ve decided to answer/address comments from other posts in new posts. if nothing else, maybe this will help me post a little more frequently and turn this blog thingy into a bit of a forum of sorts.

okay, so a few days ago i posted some lyrics to a song i’d just finished. stella was curious as to their deeper meaning. to my knowledge, there really isn’t one. all of these new songs are fairly introspective and somewhat biographical, but i should emphasize SOMEWHAT. i think that, if you’re creating art for public viewing, that you need to make it accesible to the viewer. what good is it for you to see/hear/read something and not be able to identify with it? so, while i might start with a personal kernel of emotion or story, usually by the time the process is done, i’ve massaged myself out of the song or taken it into a different direction than real life.

for instance, i wrote another song last nite (yeah, that puts me right around 7 songs this month. holy shit, man.). it’s quite possibly the most autobiographical thing i’ve written, at least until i get to the 3rd verse. you see, the only way i could figure out how to finish the song was to kill the main character. well, the main character in an autobiography would be the author.

that’s right: last nite i killed myself.

i didn’t really realize i was doing it until i’d done it, and once it was done, i was kinda freaked out. probably in the same way that dorian gray was freaked out when he saw the mutilated painting of himself that reflected all the bad things he’d done. you know how, when you do something really dumb, like almost shock yourself by reaching for the radio from the bathtub, you sit there for a second almost dumbfounded? or how, when you almost have a car accident one of the first things you do is turn down the radio? that’s how i left it last nite. i played through the song one time from front to back and realized that i’d offed myself. i then very quickly and quietly put my guitar back in the case, closed up my lyric book and walked out of my little “creative room” before something bad happened. 

what a weird, weird feeling it is knocking yourself off to a pretty melody. 

no wonder i’m tired

over the past ten days i’ve composed, written or finished five songs. some of them were songs that i’d been laboring over for almost a year, looking for that perfect bridge or turn of phrase or a finishing bit. some of them just kinda happened on accident while driving. one of them i wrote last nite after i dropped my lyrics book on the piano and liked they notes that it hit. seriously. i’m getting really flippin’ lucky right now. here’s the newest set of lyrics, hanging on:

i can’t see the sun
but i know that it’s light outside
i can’t hear the birds
but i know there’s still songs to write
lay me down and tuck me in
i’ve been at it all night…again

why can’t you just let it go
i’m past the point of hanging on
just wanted you to know

i know we don’t talk
but that don’t mean i don’t still care
i know that you’re gone
but that don’t mean there’s nothing there
let’s start over start again
i can lose, if you need to win

why can’t you just let it go
i’m past the point of hanging on
i just wanted you to know

i just wanted you to know
i’m still hanging on

if God will bless me with a couple of bigger commission checks from work, i can pay our credit cards off and maybe have a little money left over for recording. i will probably try to record everything on my own. if i do, i’ll make sure to put them up on myspace or my website or something.