THE ART OF SONG

wrote my first ones when i was fourteen
about the time i laid down the pencil and paintbox
a twin-pronged attack
strumming on my mom's classical guitar
having learnt to play a few major n minor chords
one finger tapping on my bontempi electronic organ
hardly able to play at all
what were those long-lost titles again?
'mr reid' - a strange ditty about a neighbourhood tramp
'dear jane' - a soppy tale of lost and refound love
with some imaginary teenage sweetheart
'i'll only tell you one more time'
hard day's night-era beatles rip-off
with trivial words with some organ chords i thought were clever
e flats and b flats...
as i only ever listened to early beatles lps at that time
the lyrics were pretty trivial
though the tunes weren't too bad
twas my little brother
who started showing me how you could be a bit more ambitious
putting poetry to music
'dancing in the breeze', 'the dark woods decay'
moving away from the hackneyed romantic stuff
to something a tad more meaningful
must be old tapes of this stuff lying around somewhere
overdubbed by plugging a couple of cassette decks together
pretty hissy
accentuating adolescent fireseed's reedy adenoidal voice
what's new?...
strange to think now
but over the years the songs have come and gone
the urge to write all but disappeared
while travelling across continents
though did keep a diary travelogue
the thrill and excitement of america n australasia n asia
somehow did not translate into songs...
before coming out here
living in boringmouth and londinium
hardly picked up a guitar in anger for years
didn't even bring a 6-string with me to sk
till i met mr rawlings - the talented troubadour
who turned me on to dylan n cohen n other poets
(was turning on to dylan anyway)
gave me the necessary kick up the ass
to install a little studio in the spare room
and suddenly the songs started a-flowin' again
like rivers after rain
nothing quite like writing a new song
giving birth to new melody and verse
that the universe has never heard before
that moment when a lyric springs into being
or an intresting title
or a little riff or tune or bassline
or sometimes several at once
a clever little snippet that just demands attenshun
or maybe a whole fully-formed song
that just comes bubbling out - if you're really lucky
at times you have to work hard at it
at times it just flows oh so natural
like being the conduit or receiver
of something god-given
something religious
something wondrous
the way songs happen has changed though over time, though
a function of the lifestyle, i guess
used to spend a lotta time
messing around on the geetar or keyboard
playing with chords and notes
the pretty tunes wood come
the words wood often be secondary
something to fill up the space
hence, 'i'll only tell you one more time'
and its primitive pubescent siblings
these days, don't have that luxury
i am in transit
on the bus
gazing out the window
or even staggering in the aisle
as the gears crunch in rush-hour traffic
perhaps strolling along a seoul-less boulevarde
getting high on some commuters' petrol fumes
but there's definitely somethin' about the movement
that does it for me
the sense of straight-ahead rhythm in 4/4 time
the body helping the mind to function
the changing vistas
a notebook helps
as does the dictaphone
it used to drive me crazy when i forgot a good tune or couplet
a bit more organ-ised these days, seedlings
the home studio is great for jamming along
coming up with a harmony
or solo
or bassline
to the main action
revising and editing
chopping and changing
nudging and nurturing the song along
sometimes songs or fragments don't seem to make any sense
till years later...
crossing a bridge over a river in bangkok
spring 1991
out of nowhere
the guitar riff for 'to kill or to die'
leaps into my head
exccept at that time there is no 'to kill or to die'
(this being only episode numero uno of 'the gulf war', my seedlets
georgie w's daddy at the helm of this nasty little battleship)
then walking through a forest
up in the himalaya
some months later
somehow the riff has attached itself to some lyrics
written a few years before at univercity
about the events at tianenman square
WWWHHHOOOOOOOSSSSSSSSHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
fast-forward 14 years
it's now gulf war numero dos
and fireseed has the horrors of eye-rack on his mind
and somehow T-square mutates into bad bag-dad
a mother's ordeal at the hands of the aggressors
tory and bushy's soldiers
messing up mesopatamia
messing up their own lives
messing up our lives
messing up everybody's goddam lives
aint these dudes never heard of bad karma?
despite the black subject matter
something quite satisfying
about piecing a song together like that over the years
though it's usually a real leaf to get things out of the system
while they're fresh as a daisy
if you ever get to hear any of the songs
hope they mean something to you...

b flat never
b natural sometimes
b sharp always