Glimpsed

Found this @ a crossroad yesterday. It's already in the fabric. Do you remember?

Old and New Dreams

In putting ideas into poetry, I have tried in each case to use the medium most specific for the purpose. I owe allegiance to no master.

-- Claude McKay, "Author's Word," Harlem Shadows (1922)

This morning we read these powerful words, and we asked ourselves about McKay's use of the word medium. It was powerful, especially in light of our recent move, and our new home, in Our Piece of the Rock. Any trip from here to there needs a guide.

So we offered: made a small pile of flour and placed an egg in it. We asked to see one way to do less* than splain how we do. Our vision is sketched out in the bullets. It is a pitcher of a journey: beginning, middle, end, middle, beginning. It's a homegoing of sorts. It's a fabric of sorts. It's a beauty of sorts. It's, as always, a story of sorts. It's also the way we do the things we do here.

Give this pitcher a listen. Make of it what you will.

• "Ghosts: First Variation," Albert Ayler Trio†
• "I Believe I'll Dust My Broom," Robert Johnson
• "Handwoven," Old and New Dreams
• "Cross Road Blues," Robert Johnson
• "Ghosts: Second Variation," Albert Ayler Trio

* That's 'cause less is more.
† The brovah Gary Peacock deserves some very big ups for hanging w/ this caterwaul, creating groove w/out the bars. Chea.

Role Models

We never going t'be too explicit, y'all. But in the interest of telling some of the truth some of the time, let's point in that direction. You can follow if you want.

Stage right (our left), you'll find 10 kingz & queenz that lay down the frosty tracks -- places to go w/n you're looking for the creamy filling. I'll lift each one out in the upcoming, but for now:

Go visit your bro King Slizzard over @ Twankle and Glisten. he's rolled up a mighty sweet archive and he's gonna shut it down. Dig into his cookie jar. Make sure you leave a thankyou note. He's doing it for the greater good.

P E A C E

Reversion: In Walked Bud

Back here in OPotR. Brushed the dirt of both travel and admin off my shoulders for a day or two, stared into the stacks and found the 'pod pointed to a deep stream. This is cause for two threads. First, as always, is more. Second, is how versioning be.

ONE -- More

The simplest way to get at this is w/ some bullets. I'm not gonna shoot the clip, but the aim is true on these.

• "In Walked Bud," Thelonious Monk. Antipiano version. Or is it the version where the band is the piano?
  
• "In Walked Bud," Amiri Baraka. Black rage version.
  
• "In Walked Bud with a Palette," Clarence Major. Chimp eatin' termites version.
  
• "Blue Skies," Art Tatum. He's the masta versionologist, the refixer, the scientist of the dubscience. He'll steal it from you, sell it back to you and leave you feeling better for the trade. But in't what we're talking 'bout?
  
• "Blue Skies," Frank Sinatra & Louis Armstrong. Play it on Satch.
  
• "Blue Skies," Sun Ra, the Lintels. Sing it on Sun.
  
• "(We've Got) Blue Skies," The Jackson 5. Actually stranger than the Lintels when you listen. When you're off the hits, the J5 is some pretty freaky sh*t. I'm not running it past my family. Are you?
  

Blue Days, every one of them gone. There's still plenty in the clip and one in the chamber. I'm'a be back on this tip.

TWO -- Versioning

There are about a dozen wotnesses in this house. And someone might say one wotness of this house is to play that dozen into dozens. You following? Good. See, we is Topsy.

Now that's off our chest, we've been about to say that versioning (aka the next number, aka the cover tune, aka the dub) is the way we take was and make it into gonna be again. In other words, it's a way of living.

So when we make a little pile of stones, as we have today, and leave (did we say live, or leaf?) them for you, it enacts that way, just a little bit, so you can pick them up for yourself.

Please feel free to come back by. You can even leave your own stones on the pile. That's the way it works.

P E A C E

Stacks: Palm Base to Our Piece of the Rock

"In Walked Bud," Thelonious Monk. Nope, not Trane's. The version w/ Johnny Griffin. That's the 1 w/ the mighty conjuring. He unloads the entire clip.

"Suddenly," Carmen McRea. OK. It's not Johnny G. More statesmanlike, as a tribute would be. And a narrative better than most cliches. The characters think and act in their own world.

"One Time 4 Your Mind," Nas. The parlayer. Chyea.

Just enough for the trip. I'm'a put up the files when I get back to OPotR.

Stacks: She Gwanna Raise the Devil

Until you can find me a biography of Big Joe Williams that is not overrun w/ some made up bluesman story, you better stick to the music. All that wandering and juke joint might as well be in a museum or your ethnomusicology perfesser's textbook.

In the mean time, no one takes"When the Chariot Comes," and versions it all over again into basic gangsta better than Big Joe. While we're stopping on this tip, Thurston Moore might wanna take a look at that 9 string box the man beats on, cause it's further out than 10 Glenn Branca symphonies, even after you take into account the extra points Big Joe gets for getting there way first.

• "She'll Be Coming Around the Mountain," Big Joe Williams
  
• "Elevate Me Baby," Big Joe Williams
• "Rooting Ground Hog," Big Joe Williams

I root both night and day.

Whereabouts

Kings and queens!

Been moving. Gotta pray, cause moving has big old mojo.

Left Dogtown for a bigger admin post in Our Piece of the Rock. Spartacus is now my mayor. It's a city of much false acclaim, but for all the rattle of sirens, it's still true blue, on almost every corner. Weren't a subway map for Dogtown, that's for sure.

Gonna rebuild my face here.

P E A C E

• "Hell Hound On My Trail," Robert Johnson