Today is the last Monday that falls during the 50 Songs in 90 Days Challenge! In celebration and in homage to the past three mindblowing months of songwriting, here is the kind of song that can only come into being within a closeknit and collaborative musical community such as the one I’m so proud to be a part of.

This is what we have termed a Telephono Song. Yes, we do like our games over there, and anything that will get us closer to 50 songs is an instant hit. Telephono Songs play out exactly like a broken telephone: Person 1 writes a simple song (one instrument, one vocal line) and sends it on to Person 2. Person 2 listens to it 3 times, records what they’ve heard, and sends it on to the next person. Repeat.

Here is the Telephono Song that I started! In order of appearance: Me, Helen’s Evil Twin, Rose Deschamps, Nancy Rost, Hoopshank, Dan Wallbank, and Tim Wille-Jørgenson.

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Peanut Butter and Jam
Original Lyrics:

Peanut butter and jam time baby!
Oh peanut butter and jam!
The craving that I have is not for
Chicken, cheese or ham but good old

Peanut butter and jam time baby!
Just peanut butter and jam!
It’s sugar, protein, carbs rolled into one!
Peanut butter and jam!

Comments (6) Sep 29 2008

Yesterday saw me scrambling around to write a song for today, but severely lacking in inspiration. I logged onto the 50/90 chat in the hopes of finding some, and before I said a word, my prayers were answered in the form of a request from the wonderful Dan Wallbank. Dan asked if I wanted to put lyrics to some music he had written for a female vocalist that had been lying languid for a while.

He pointed me to a couple of tracks, and one (he was calling it “Canyon”) started talking to me immediately. Not only that, but it was giving me words to an idea I’ve been wanting to write about but couldn’t quite get ahold of. Sweet!

Lyrics were done yesterday, and I recorded the vocals today during lunch (just as well it had to be done quickly because my voice is still in an excruciating recovery stage from last week’s collaboration with Mal).

This process was completely new to me! This year, I’ve cowritten music and lyrics and written music to fit another’s lyrics, but this is the first time I’ve written lyrics to someone else’s music, and it was nothing but satisfying! Dan, thank you so much for the wonderful collaboration opportunity, and for helping me get these words across.

(Also….I think I’m completely addicted to reverb?)

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Out of my Head
Music: Dan Wallbank
Lyrics: Debs

In the sunlight I awake
Smiling softly at your touch
Then my senses come to me
I remember in a rush

There’s no imprint in the sheets
There’s no voice to say hello
Nothing but the silence here
To remind me I’m alone

I’ve done well all by myself
I’ve been good at being strong
Never letting myself dwell
Know it’s better to move on

Every day I shield my thoughts
Turn my eyes to other things
But at night my mind’s unleashed
And the dreams bring you to me

For the love of what we were
Set me free and get out of my head,
and get out of my head
For all that we aspire to be
Separately just get out of my head,
just get out of my head

Go to work and hit the shops
Run my errands, pass the time
Wonder where the hours went
smile and know that I’m just fine

Back at home, I brew some tea,
Find a pencil, try to write
Nothing comes, and I decide
To take a walk into the night

And I listen to the leaves
Count the stars up in the sky
Watch the crescent moon shine down
When a stranger passes by

And I catch the subtle scent
of your pineapple shampoo
and I’m back where I was
trying not to think of you

For the love of what we were
Set me free and get out of my head,
and get out of my head
For all that we aspire to be
Separately just get out of my head,
just get out of my head

For the love of what we were,
Set me free and get out of my head,
just get out of my head

Comments (6) Sep 22 2008

This song was purely a result of being in the 50/90 chatroom at the right shade of night with the right person. It was about 2:00am when Mal, my fellow crazy, suggested “we bottle and sell ourselves” as a cure for insomnia (Hoopshank’s? Charlie’s?) and we jumped on it, spewing out lyrics that progressively got weirder and more delicious as the night went on.

All the lyrics were written that night, and then Mal worked his magic and sent over his vocals plus the wonderful rhythm section. This is a completely new genre for me, so I mused for a while about what I was going to add to it, and then decided to add vocals that were as weird and freaky as I could get them. This was a great opportunity to play with the vocal and pitch modulations on Garageband (I can sound like a chipmunk AND a droid! Or maybe a droidmunk?) Sent it all to Mal to mix, and voila!

You can hear Mal talk more about how this song came to be 34:40 minutes into this podcast. If you keep listening, you can also hear me singing a duet written by the very talented Josh Belville. Edit: I speak about it further on today’s podcast too!

(I blew the top of my range out singing those freakishly high “ahh’s”, which will make my choir reauditon tonight err…interesting. It was totally worth it).

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Let’s Bottle and Sell Us
Our entrails bound for pharmacy shelves
Our brains pickled and kosher
Our toenails twixt the gristled bits
Our stringling mustard hair wrapped tight.

Get your fresh hot amygdala.

Our eyeballs gaze from within the brine
Without noses we don’t smell at all
Stewed ears add a touch of taste
Finger claws scrabble at the dirty glass
Tattooed skin makes the label.

Let’s bottle us and sell us
Dismember ourselves for glamour and glory
Let’s bottle us and sell us
Drink us down
We’re delicious.

Preferred customers will receive our souls for extra spice
And two freeze dried moustaches stuck to ABC gum
For pennies a pound you can have our livers, onions not included
Our kidneys will keep well in the fridge.

Let’s bottle us and sell us
Dismember ourselves for glamour and glory
Let’s bottle us and sell us
Drink us down
We’re delicious.
Let’s bottle us and sell us
Drink until the dregs remain
Feel our lives coursing through your blood
Let’s bottle us and sell us
Drink us down
We’re nutritious.

Each tender tendon is lovingly extracted
and then subjected to the most exacting
examination standards.

Certified organic,
produced for cannibals,
airline crashes in the mountains,
and the Donner Party.

Let’s bottle us and sell us
Dismember ourselves for glamour and glory
Let’s bottle us and sell us
Drink us down
We’re delicious.
Let’s bottle us and sell us
Drink until the dregs remain
Feel our lives coursing through your blood
Let’s bottle us and sell us
Drink us down
We’re nutritious.

Comments (5) Sep 15 2008

Have you ever created something using the Exquisite Corpse Method? The basic idea is to create a group collaboration – each person adds to the growing work in sequence, seeing only the last snippet of what the last person added. I used to love creating stories with a group of friends this way when I was little, and that hasn’t changed much.

This week’s song is a cowrite between myself and four other songwriters who are also participating in the 50 Songs in 90 Days Challenge, using the Exquisite Corpse Method. The parameters were to record 30-40 seconds of music, and then send just the last lyrical phrase to the next person, who would repeat the process. It’s a fun and random way to write, and a great opportunity to join forces with some truly amazing artists.

Quite a few of these songs are now rattling around the 50/90 site, and calling them unique is an understatement. They also seem to be fraught with strange coincidences, and this one is no exception. It’s strange that it weaves in and out of the water, but even stranger, it begins by drawing from Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy and ends in the death of a whale.

From the wondering minds of (in order) myself, Helen’s Evil Twin, Nancy Rost, Hoopshank and SwampJaw), here is Soggy Towel River.

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Soggy Towel River

Debs:
The number one rule of playing it cool when travelling abroad in the stars
Is to take the one the thing that both beggars and kings
rely on wherever they are
So always bring a towel when you’re hitchhiking
So always bring a towel wherever you go
So always bring a towel when you’re hitchhiking
Your destiny is yours to command
With a towel in your hand,

Helen’s Evil Twin:
You walked out of the shower
You’d been hogging the bathroom for over an hour
Playing with your rubber ducky making lots of mess
Splashing all about and you never would have guessed
That you’d slip on a soggy flannel and knock yourself out

Nancy Rost:
That you’d slip on a soggy flannel
And knock yourself out
Oh, I could spout off about cleaning up
After yourself I could try to make it your fault
But the fact is you can take care of yourself
And your bathroom habits are no-one’s business
But yours and yours alone
Besides, I know that my penchant for colognes
Scented to resemble tales from the Brothers Grimm
Is equally disturbing to you
So fair is fair

Hoopshank:
Unfair is unfair
An affair is an affair
Scarborough fair is Scarborough fair
All I hope is that the river washes us to the sea

Swampjaw:
All I hope is that the sea washes us away
We’re so tired of being stuck on this beach
There’s Anchorage in ship’s bow
Wasting away like a giant leech
I guess we’ll soon be Eskimo chow
Oh to be back in the ocean free
Oh for the ocean in just one day
Oh the krill would not agree
On the trip to this little bay

Comments (2) Sep 08 2008

This turned into a surprisingly ambitious project (probably my craziest project yet), written and recorded today, the day after my return from the organic agricultural farm in Quebec where I spent the last week.

Aside from harvesting and some planting, much of my time there was spent eradicating this weed, Hairy Galinsoga, an invasive weed that seemed to be taking over, well, everything, but the squash patch in particular. Of course being an organic farm that does not use sprays, my fellow Wwoofers and I, as well as the two employees of the farm had to pull these all out by hand. Of course, sitting there resulted in delicious bouts of insanity, in which Bacchus figured prominently. Each night, I closed my eyes and saw nothing but Hairy Galinsoga. Back home now, I’m still seeing the stuff, and it seemed only fitting to immortalize our weeding plight in song.

Someday, I definitely hope to get this one mixed properly. All the instruments except the piano (which is improvised) are courtesy of Garageband loops. All the voices are me unaltered, except the lowest voices in Parts I and III, where I modified the pitch and added reverb to Bacchus.

So this song is a Rock Opera about a weed, some squash, and the God of Wine. Is it just me, or are these songs continually getting weirder and weirder as the weeks go on?

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Hairy Galinsoga (a rock opera in 3 parts)

PART I
[Hairy Galinsoga]

From beneath you we devour
Choke your crops with daisy flowers
Bring you to your knees for hours
You have hands but we’ve got power!

We can root from stem or seed
And no matter what your speed
Know that we will not concede
We’re the world’s most potent weed

Hairy Galinsoga!
We are squashing your squash!
Hairy Galinsoga!
All your fields are belonging to us!

You can curse and scream and pray
But to your profound dismay
We are here and here to stay
Since we know you don’t use spray!

Hairy Galinsoga!
We are reaping your beans!
Hairy Galinsoga!
There are more of us than you can ever dream!

PART II
[Hapless Cucurbita pepo]

I’m just an innocent zucchini, I’m just starting out, to grow
Here with the bees and roots and grasses, shouldn’t be that hard, I know
I need to see the sunlight but closing in on me and mine
are
Hairy Galinsoga!
Shadows over me and mine
Hairy Galinsoga!
Who will save us from these monsters?
Hairy Galinsoga!
Blocking us from what we crave
Hairy Galinsoga!
We need someone to save from this all

PART III
[Bacchus, Saviour of Squash]

BACCHUS SMASH!
BACCHUS SMASH!

Bacchus hears the call!
He’s six foot, seven inches tall
Riled up and ready to brawl
Hairy Galinsoga, get ready to fall!

BACCHUS SMASH!
BACCHUS SMASH!

He’s got a hammer the gardening tools
To wreck some Galinsoga molecules
Today the Galinsoga’s gonna lose
And we will celebrate with lots of booze

BACCHUS SMASH!
BACCHUS SMASH!

Hairy Galinsoga! (BACCHUS SMASH!)
In a great big pile!
Hairy Galinsoga! (BACCHUS SMASH GOOD!)
Bring on the fire!

(BACCHUS LIKES FIRE!
BACCHUS KILL ALL HAIRY GALINSOGA!)

The growing crops are swinging on the vine
The squash is happy and the sun, it shines
The field is cleared now let it be a sign
You don’t fuck with the God of wine!

Hairy Galinsoga!
It’s time you learn! (You don’t fuck with the God)
Hairy Galinsoga! (You don’t fuck with)
Burn, baby burn! (You don’t fuck with the God of wine)

Comments (4) Sep 01 2008