As a contrast to my cosmic stuff, here’s some weird blues.
I always wanted to hear Bukowski talking his stuff over some wayward blues, so I took the following:
Brainpicker – Charles-bukowski-reads-friendly-advice-to-a-lot-of-young-men
and put it over some rough edged blues. It sounds like a drunk blues band, but then that is only right when it comes to Bukowski.
Guitar used was the Vintage Flying V, and the bass was a Yamaha 5 string.
Great inspiration!
It is like drunken blues: like when your body is floaty and your mind stumbles around or your head is floaty and your legs are doing their thing. I was doing stuff with poetry a few months back, but hadn't thought of Bukowski. The words and music work really well here!
I have been reading Bukowski for a few years, both prose and poetry, and all the time I could hear his stuff over blues. I kept looking to see if anyone had done it ... if they have, I couldn't find it.
There is something totally bluesy in Bukowski's outlook: that real outsider thing, that really down thing thing, that seedy, scruffy thing ... he was a bluesman in the real sense. I kept hearing it in my head.
I wanted that really bitter joy that only Bukowski can do, and this poem has it: "Don't try man; don't even bother - if it wasn't for bad luck I'd have no luck at all".
Its a fantastic mix Bukowski and Blues. Big congratulations on it.
Sweet and floaty and legless
I'm reminded of the poet Baudelair saying "be drunken, be always drunken" ... how about getting that sense of drunkenness into your sounds too - it happens here!
I think the Bukowski book I've got is called something like 'Play the piano drunk until your fingers bleed a little'. I'll have to dig it out. Yo
I was reading his 'The Days Run Away Like Horses Over the Hills', which is poems - and then his prose ' Notes of a Dirty Old Man'. It's all essentially blues!
Well you hid those blues chops well, brother! And so loving the way you wilfully mangle the paradigm - like Bukowski did, of course! :)
- I started out with blues, and all the free form guitar noise starts out from the blues too. So tracks like this are going back to my roots, but the roots have now been twisted like a mandrake!
weird blues indeed - nice!
Awesome Bill !
About all that's potentially missing is dropping a whiskey bottle or pausing to light a smoke.
That's exactly the atmosphere I wanted there, that kind of Tom Waitsian thing. Might need to put some chinking glasses and night club background chatter on there for added ambience
Could work, some movement and chair/glass counterpoint!
This is appropriately minimal and dwelling and building.
I hadn't seen it in those Heideggerian terms, but you are right
I'm reminded here somehow of a latter-day Nick Cave song: "Bukowski was a jerk!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Berryman was best!!!!!!!!!!!! he wrote like wet papier mache/ went the Hemming-way/ weirdly on wings & with MAXIMUM PAIN!!! WE CALL UPON THE AUTHOR TO EXPLAIN!!!!!"
You've opened up some interesting things there! I had to listen to the Cave song, which is great. Then I had to check out Berryman, a poet I was aware of, but hadn't really studied. Of course, Bukowski knew he was a jerk and a 'dirty old man', his epitaph being "don't try" - and this poem is of that ilk. Berryman and Hemingway both killed themselves [and both had fathers who had killed themselves]. But all three had alcohol abuse in common.
Yea, the alcohol abuse thing is sadly too often the curse of the writer. I know I sure drank a TON when I wrote, and it wasn't out of emulating, it was a way of quieting things down when the words didn't come. That Cave album is my favorite of his modern work - the first time post-Blixa that the band actually keeps up with im.
What the!!!! Super production!!!......but how ya gonna top that one Bro!!!,
I'm gonna have to wait my time!
Yes quality takes time I kick em out far too quick Bro, but I make something new up every time I pick up a guitar Bro mi ipad is stuffed full an I have about 10 tracks to record all in various states I cannot stop lol!!! Whats good an whats quality is a different issue lol but boy do I make lots a noise you would not want to live next door to mi lol but am sure you have lots more to come Bro just keep building on the good,
Now whos preaching!!!
Take me back to church!
Yes you got some very cool sounds going on as ya know am not run a the mill I follow a pentatonic theme but always like to go of plan lol!!!!, ya not holding back for sure Bro,
oh Brother Blues what a tone ya got here makes mi smile ear grabbing when she kicked in!!!
That's the solo I wanted you to hear! As I say elsehwere, it's V with Wilkinson pick ups. Even though they're humbuckers they've got that that bright spikey sound, but not thin like some single coils, but not muffled like so many humbuckers are. I immediately thought of Albert King's Vs etc., for that stone blues type playing
Real sweet tone from quality pick ups its not just about the notes anymore Bro I spend hours looking for tones an this ones a real cracker very well done,
Man, I would recommend these pick ups to anyone, and thye're not pricey. They've got 'gold' covers on
Off the scale here Bro bass bashing lol
There's some phat bottom on that bass baby
Kept my interest all the way through Bro lots a respect as that takes some doing!!!,
Bend to the heavens and pull mi right in!!!
That's a Sky Church sound
Defo no roof no limits Bro I hope am not rubbing off on ya am going to have to look harder for those heavenly notes lol, Al
Koss always looked for those notes, finding in Albert and BB too
Not easy to hit em Bro sometimes takes all mi pinkies to hold em as I play on fatter strings than i can handle just to get that extra bit a tone!!,
Great opening Bro way cool!!!, Al
says what it is from the word go!
Very clever intermix of sounds Bro you shine I think you should weave a few more hard core Blues into ya stream Bro this works a treat for me,
Thing is, for my own stuff, I can only put out a blues based track if it is special to me. Whereas with experimental stuff the experiment itself justifies its posting. But with blues, even experimental blues like this, it has to be true to the blues. It has to have the right feeling. As Jimi said, it's easy to play blues, but very difficult to feel blues. Having said that, if I had more time, I might open another account only for blues.
Time is the killer Bro I can only play by feel its all I know lol dont understand a single note lol so has to come from mi sole an am defo feeling your Blues!!,
That's always the best way - play by feel and use your ear as a guide. Best players did that - look at Jimi playing live! Etges closed head towards the heavens, playing purely by feel and sound - people say he hit a few 'wrong' notes! There are no 'wrong' notes!
We all do those Bro its how we get to the good notes lol the only problem with high creativity is you vary rarely play the same thing the same twice as ya forever making adjustments lol I would be no good doing sets lol!!,
Oh, yes, the fade made me want more of where you might have gone.
There were a couple of more 12 bars after that with muted riff, kinda British Blues Boom style, but a wanted to keep the final Bukowski pay off hanging in the air at the end.
This is quite making it for me, now at the seaside in the rain.
: blues fall down like rain
I learned that lesson long ago, I used to write poetry, then I discovered the beast and the way to make it land on tape.
... do you ever have regrets about not sticking to poetry - a far lower maintenance pursuit, at the very least!
No, the muse shifted - I'd hit a wall where it couldn't talk in words any more adequately. And it wasn't any lower maintenance, I was a method writer, I have tons of material from back then. Now it's an occasional and inspired thing, it used to be a drive that made the music seem sane.
Bukowski's hoisting one to you right now.
The guy is being ridiculous, giving out all this crazy advice - a poet telling others not to be a poet, imagine.
that *is* kinda bluesy
There is a certain range of blues signatures which shuffle in and out here, some of them go awry, others come unstuck ....
i like the subtle chording just off to the left.
That chording was the glue for the whole track at first, but I pulled it out from most areas, keeping it for here
nice scrape!
Vintage Flying V is the Albert King type model - tunomatic bridge with through body stringing, and no trem. So vicious scrapes and wild bends become the main expressive techniques
The low down vibe fits Bukowski exactly! You are a Genius!
Wow thanks! Although I think it is the genius of Bukowski you hear here. I had done lots of blues type pieces, but never posted them. I wanted to hear a Bukowski type rap over them [or a Johnny Bakerlite!]. But I didn't want something corny sounding. This poem fit nicely with a bit of manipulation and experimentation.
The Blues executed in your signature way...awesome!
Thanks! I started by playing straight blues. Then I started abstracting the blues. Then I played abstractly. Returning to the blues, I play them from the perspective of abstraction
Love your Guitar sounds!
Thanks! Here I used a Flying V guitar which I think is a very special model/type. I have that played clean, the Wilkinson humbuckers giving that classic sound. The other track is the same guitar put through a Fuzz Face with various cascading delays
Awesome...like going back in time, read a lot of Bukowski years ago!
I like his downbeat outsider view of the world - he is also a great poet
Indeed!
Nice deconstructed blues session, Bill. Lots of interesting guitars flying around.
- I need to have a blues exorcism now and again! It was the Vintage Flying V, it had that Albert King feel to it [on the clean leads of course]. I then overdubbed the same guitar through a Fuzz Face and then through a delay.
lyrics
FRIENDLY ADVICE TO A LOT OF YOUNG MEN
Go to Tibet
Ride a camel.
Read the bible.
Dye your shoes blue.
Grow a beard.
Circle the world in a paper canoe.
Subscribe to The Saturday Evening Post.
Chew on the left side of your mouth only.
Marry a woman with one leg and shave with a straight razor.
And carve your name in her arm.
Brush your teeth with gasoline.
Sleep all day and climb trees at night.
Be a monk and drink buckshot and beer.
Hold your head under water and play the violin.
Do a belly dance before pink candles.
Kill your dog.
Run for mayor.
Live in a barrel.
Break your head with a hatchet.
Plant tulips in the rain.
from Searching the Blues,
released January 24, 2018
Charles Bukowski reading his own poem, ‘Friendly Advice to a Lot of Young Men’.
Bill Boethius, all instruments, arrangement and production
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