The entirety of my band’s recent (3/23/13) CD Release Party is now posted on YouTube: Watch on YouTube. This combines footage from two stationary cameras plus a couple of iPhones that my friend Glenn walked around with. He did some editing to remove the dead air. The audio is open-air in the club, so it’s Read more…
Nakedly Self-Examined Music
I’ve been leaking tunes from this album on episodes 64, 68, 69, and there’ll be another on ep. 76, but now it’s available in its entirety. You can download a few mp3s for free from newpeopleband.com, and buy the CD or mp3s there as well. I’m also making the album entirely free for PEL Citizens Read more…
One of the recurring themes of PEL is the power dynamics in philosophizing. This is not so much the case in what we read but in how we deal with guests, with the authors, with each other. The situation seems pretty simple: We’re each on our own independent, spiritual quest. We can study on our Read more…
Just a bit about the song featured on our terrorism episode. You can hear “1000 Points of Light” and the rest of the MayTricks’ self-titled album here. This was off of my first full album, released when I was a senior in college, and this song was recorded the previous summer as a sort of Read more…
Go check out the album. Our humor episode gave me an excuse to finally get this album all converted and posted for those interested. To quote my liner notes: Black Jelly Beans are the ones that normal people with a fine taste for fine things pick out and throw to the weevils, but which certain Read more…
Go check out the album. I’ve posted several times before about my college band, The MayTricks, which was active from maybe early 1991 through the summer of 1994, after which I left Ann Arbor for graduate school in Madison. It was a pretty weird group of guys with a lot of ideas and enthusiasm. Since Read more…
Feb 032012
Listen to “Freeway” and “Stories.” I’ve done some remote collaboration over recent years with mixed results. I’ll record a song and send it to a drummer or guitarist I used to play with, and sometimes the person will be all jazzed about it and record a part right away, or sometimes the process will drag Read more…
Listen to “False Morality” and a more recent tune of Cliff’s: “I See God.” Probably my first experience with hardcore atheism was hanging out with Cliff Kaminsky, who played with my college band The MayTricks for about a year from fall ’93 to its end in August ’94. We auditioned Cliff a year or two Read more…
Listen to “I Believe.” This tune owes much in its conception to the old Steve Martin bit “What I Believe,” but I used that rough format to express, back in 2002 when I wrote the bulk of this (calling it “Stalking George Burns”), something about my actual, momentary beliefs (when I’m at worst); or distilling Read more…
Listen to “Mother’s Day” and “Poppo!”. Two very different but equally unfit-for-regular-public-consumption songs here. I wrote “Mother’s Day” in September 2007 to send to my mom. She’d been diagnosed with an especially nasty kind of cancer the previous summer, and I’d spent time with her during her surgery and treatment. I was just depressed, and Read more…
Listen and read about Lee Abramson’s “Shalom.” Thanks to Lee for his donation to support our podcast. I encourage you all to look here and read about his struggle with ALS, his candidacy for president (here’s his platform), and his musical career. I know he’d love to hear any nice things you have to say Read more…
Listen to “Rembrance.” When reading Schleiermacher, I was reminded of my friend Steve Petrinko, who was my main cohort in my college band The MayTricks (previously covered in a number of music blog posts). Working in close proximity like that at that time of life (we were also apartment-mates for a couple of years) meant Read more…
Today’s musical nugget is called “Words & Numbers,” as recorded by Madison Lint. New readers may not remember my 1/2 year music blog, wherein I forced myself to complete, or digitize, or remix or remaster a song from my past every week. The point of that was to get me to finish up a couple Read more…
Feb 092011
My band, New People, has now finally completed our second album. You can hear tracks and purchase it (if you’d like) here. You can also find details there about our CD Release Party tonight (Wednesday), for those of you in the Madison, WI area. Note the nifty art by Ken Gerber, who did the P.E.L. Read more…
As I hit the big 30 here, let me thank you for your indulgence, to the extent that you’ve actually been reading/listening. I’m marking this round number with another whole album, this time the debut full album by The MayTricks from 1992, cleverly entitled The MayTricks. As this was really the first full-length album I Read more…
At last, here’s the final tune from the 1991 MayTricks demo (which I’ve made a new page for), “Her Skin Is Only Warm.” The song was written by Steve and was our most bombastic. It was modeled on The Rolling Stones’s “Steel Wheels” album, meaning it has kind of awkward “Rock! Rock!” lyrics, but it Read more…
Three songs today: cover tunes by The MayTricks from 1992 or so. Specifically, the Police’s “Can’t Stand Losin’ You” (which I sing) and Talking Heads’ “And She Was” and The Rolling Stones’ “Paint It Black” (both of which Steve sings). These are actual, multi-track studio recordings done with probably as much care as many of Read more…
Correcting my previous post, apparently this is my first recorded original composition: “The Funny Train.” While I had always assumed this to be a traditional melody, a quick web search reveals no previous versions, so I hereby claim it. However, I note that “There was a little man, and he had a little can” appeared Read more…
At the half way point of this 2010 experiment, I’ve got something very special to post: my first ever intentional recording of a song, which was also my first experience playing with a band that I put together. It’s from spring ’86 and called “Venus on Earth.” I had some little music composition program on Read more…
Today I present the crown jewel of my high school band years: The Spring ’89 version of “Run Away.” I’ve previously blogged about this song, which is pretty cheesy, but pleasurable, I think. This version owes a lot to the keyboard programming of the last couple of albums by The Cars (my favorite band at Read more…
Recent Comments