Dare I write this? Maybe this is mostly an exploration of an idea. I know unequivocally what I personally find to be the most perfect song I’ve ever heard. You may say I’m full of shit. I can’t argue with that. No doubt there are hundreds if not thousands of perfectly perfect songs. It’s just that every time I listen to this one, I can’t help but feel it is a work of such pure genius that all singer-songwriters should at least be familiar with it. But, like I say, this is an exploration, maybe a journey in musical and aesthetic thinking.
Crazy new sounds and melodies consistently showed up on the radio for those of us growing up in the 1950s and 1960s (and on into the early 1970s). Every week or so brought astoundingly unique, creative, highly developed songwriting, production, and performance that constantly knocked our socks off…again, and again, and again. The record companies back then understood they could only partially make the call about what would work and what wouldn’t. Artists ruled. So did their listeners.
I still remember hearing “I Wanna Hold Your Hand,” in the first few days of 1964 right after it came out. I remember as well Elton John’s “Rocket Man” in April 1972, and “Sweet Caroline,” by Neil Diamond in May of 1969, both within the first day or two of release. And so many more. We were all sitting-duck virgins over and over again, sometimes on a daily basis, waiting for the latest by the performers we loved (and didn’t know we would come to love). DJs could be so artful with our pristine ears: “Here’s a new one from a guy we’ve never heard of named Don McLean. The song is called ‘American Pie.’ Weird name, but I think you’ll like it.”
Finally, a hardcover, paperbound version of Sound Effect Infinity is available!
For now, you can only get it through Amazon. They’re set up to ship to you on-demand. Yes, you may have pre-ordered a version from my old publisher, but that book never shipped (sad face here). They were having issues with a big media company merger. After waiting three years, it seemed only right to take back my copyrights and go to work independently. That’s how real artists do things anyway. I’m not proud, just old-enough these days to be seriously tired and done with all of the bullshit.
[Note from 2026: A lot happened to prevent the proper publication of Sound Effect Infinity until February 2026, where this note is coming from. Click the links where you see them, and you’ll find the book posted to Amazon as a special edition hardcover offering. If you read below, you’ll see where things were, but not where they are now]
I already feel like a jerk. The only thing that is going to keep me from being selfish and single-minded here in 2024 is if I need surgery or get diagnosed with cancer or just don’t wake up some morning. A solid, working draft of my third novel for The Story Plant is due in December of 2024. The title we’re operating with right now is Notes on the Golden Country. I spent much of 2023 doing research and making notes for this year’s efforts. By late August I had started up on a first draft. As 2024 gets uncaged, I am about 120 pages in to Part I of three parts. I’m going to be a selfish jerk the rest of this year until I’m done. Meaning, I don’t want to come over to your house, go on a long walk, or anything else that will muddle my focus on writing this very odd story.
I’ve spent my entire life astounded by the magic of music, appreciating everything from opera and Gregorian chant to bluegrass and every kind of jazz there is. But what exactly is being touched in us and inspired when we listen to our favorite songs? What is this creation of new and complex emotion, the stimulation of sensuality, bittersweet memory, at times even, that awareness of sublime connection to the universe? How full and rich our lives are because of the beauty and profundity of sound waves organized into melody, rhythm, timber, and harmonic tones! Friedrich Nietzsche said it best: “Without music, life would be a mistake.”
My novel, Old Music for New People, is driven in part by its characters’ thoughts and feelings about specific songs and musicians (baseball and food also have prominent roles in the plot). Many of the stories I write, whether long or short, have music painted into them. Sometimes I wonder if I’m a bit too hopeful about the idea of using words to describe what music does to characters emotionally and philosophically–and what it does to readers as well in their everyday lives.
We’ve all been wondering how to counteract the lunacy and mayhem that seems to have seriously marked 2015 throughout the world. Right? It’s not just terrorists, out-of-control cops, and criminals. There’s a lot of hatred a certain category of people have been spewing on TV, social media, and, probably, in your neighborhood and workplace.
You may have your own answer, but to me the most powerful weapon global society has against all this fear and negativity is the freedom and joy of young people and the art they are making. Watch this video trailer below:
The full video can be accessed by clicking here: Community of Dancers Boston Edition. This is my youngest son Conor’s project. He is a 20-year-old film student (and hip-hop dancer) at Emerson College Continue reading →
I’m about to bombard all my Facebook peeps and Twitter followers with a breadcrumb path of links to Jeff Buckley videos. No apologies folks. Jeffy would have been 48 on Monday, November 17 (my mom’s birthday…she’s wherever Jeff may be now).
If you know Jeff’s work, then you’ll enjoy some of the choice clips I’m posting. If you don’t enjoy Jeff, watch them anyway, cuz this is a problem you need to resolve. The dude could sing, play, perform, and compose like no other (‘cept maybe Jimi).
And if you don’t really know Buckley, or if you’ve kind of just wondered, well, there’s eight short videos coming at you over the next 36 hours.
And let me note, this is not stupid fan-boy idolatry. I’m a musician and a singer. Music has been a huge part of my life. The dude was a fucking genius. The fact that we lost him at the age of 30 should haunt every one of us forever. He gets a super special cameo spot in my novel, Beyond the Will of God, because of the strange loss to music and the arts his passing meant. Pay attention to what he says in the interview I’m posting on Sunday evening. There’s some interesting stuff about the mystery of creativity and the power of music.
Happy Birthday, Jeff. Happy Birthday to Jeff’s mom, Mary Guibert, too. And a big Mmwaah birthday kiss to my mom, Ellen Horgan, as well.
The Jimi Hendrix Experience performs for Dutch television show Fenklup in 1967 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Anyone who’s watched video of Jimi Hendrix (or was lucky enough to see him in person) knows that his LIVE, improvisational guitar performances are unparalleled. His early reputation of wild child shaman boogie man was something many of us not only revered, but we saw that persona as an ultimate expression of who we thought we might want to be (us guys anyway).
As much as Jimi was the epitome of masculine style for us hippie-heads back in the day (gotta admit I was 9 – 12 when he was peaking) his stage presence with all its cosmic force and roaring witch doctor invention was what truly made you want to “Be Like Jimi.”
Here’s the interesting thing, though: musically, as brilliant and inspiring as his creative stage performances could be, it was his work in the studio crafting, creating, and massaging songs that was his true brilliance. The video below provides a good example of this genius and its effect.
Jimi wrote “The Wind Cries Mary” one night after arriving in England, and the next day The Experience recorded it on the fly during the last 20-minutes of studio time they’d paid for that day.
Watch the short video below for words from the cats who were there. It was just supposed to be a first-run demo kind of thing. Jimi kept figuring out new things he wanted to do with the guitar as they went along, so they kept dubbing these inventions in as fast as they could. I’m putting a link to the song at the end of this piece, too, so you can see the final product performed live just a few months later.
Note here what Eddie Kramer points out about Jimi playing the song’s chords softly while he sings the vocals. Jimi was very insecure about his voice. He needed to hug a guitar to his chest in order to sing the lyrics of one of the most beautiful songs that came out of the psychedelic era, something he’d written not 24-hours earlier. It’s such a treat for us 47 years later to have Kramer break down that moment.
The studio-Jimi, the composer-Jimi, and the techno-Jimi were the secret geniuses that we don’t think about enough. Go back and listen to those first albums (Are You Experienced?,Axis Bold as Love, and Electric Ladyland). His genius is still steaming in the air after nearly 50 years if you listen carefully enough.
What I want to know, though, is how he was able to be so gosh darned endlessly creative. I mean, we’re talking floating out above the heavens with his energy and musical soul all the time, every waking hour of every day. Yeah, it was the pinnacle moment in his life. Many gifted artists have their most prolific years from about 22 to 28 or so. Young synapses fire constantly. I remember so many of my friends when we were at that age (in the late ’70s and early ’80s), so many ideas, so much nascent art and political thinking percolating out of every orifice we had. But what we were doing obviously wasn’t as profound or freaking playfully connected to Infinity the way Jimi’s work was.
Maybe his creativity was partly more a function of all the people who were around him, along with being part of a moment in recording history when new tricks and gadgets were part of everyday music engineering for the first time ever. Obviously, there were more than a few insanely important artists roaming the world back then, bumping into each other, influencing one another and competing. And maybe, too, all the people around Jimi everyday, plus all the fans (and in those days we all knew good music when we heard it), inspired a palpable confidence in him, which in turn amped up the creative output, which in turn meant further acceptance and confidence, etc.
No one has come along since then with that level of fearless genius. No one. There’s a lot of talent out there, but no one comes close to that kind of creative force…in my opinion.
This is the second installment in a series on real people’s thoughts about Jimi and what he meant to them…and to modern music. Listen to the song:
