Friday June 23, 2006

Tick

Ooooo. A very chilly night. I was very cold, even though I wore a hat, two layers of thermals and had two folded-in-half woollen blankets on top of the duvet. Just about to light the fire.

 

Woke up this morning feeling good about last night's song, and with some interesting ideas about how to perform the song vocally using the Headrush. I've been listening to Bjork's voice album (what's the name of it? It's printed in black on a black cover, so I guess not surprising I can't recall...) Christine's been listening to it a lot, too - as she's been writing the music for the latest Tim Bray musical. Our house has been full of children's sea shanties, incredibly catchy and singable as well as being slightly bent and just a teensy bit insane because Christine wrote them. One of them she based loosely on the Bjork model. Nicely discordant and sweeping.

 

I've also woken up with a compulsion to open Sian's Emergency Care Package. The one with the fuzzy red cross. My fingers are twitching. I keep walking up to it, bending down to it, then walking away.

 

Perhaps it's because I watched a documentary last night about a bunch of teenagers with Tourettes. I didn't realise that Tourettes tics can be physical or vocal - I thought it was just a vocalising issue. But a lot of the young people on the documentary had the most extraordinary compulsive body movements to deal with.

 

Stuff I watch often really gets into me. When I saw 'Braveheart' I walked around for months holding my head as if I had knee-length hair and moving my legs like I was wearing a long gown.

I was about 25 at the time.

 

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There's something about building a successful fire that makes you feel like you can do anything. It feels like I'm a surgeon saving a life. Using the tongs to place all the components in just the right oxygen-rich positions. Nurse, the poker please.

 

 

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Ok so I've finished and polished that one. I celebrated by kicking my guitar off its stand and onto the floor. (It was an accident. I'm not that rock'n'roll).

 

This one's going to be a much more complex arrangement than the others - which is good for variety. This is the only song so far that's made me have a little tangi. Few tears as I sang it. I think I need to pull myself together.

 

It's called 'Home' now, and it very much reminds me of Van Morrison's 'Sweet Thing'  or The Waterboys' 'Whole of the Moon' - it's quite a long time before you get to the chorus/hook, and really the main build-up is at the end of the song.

 

The other day we watched a documentary (another one!) about Roy Orbison. It was fascinating hearing his songwriting process unravelled a bit. So many of his songs went against accepted notions of arrangement. That one where he's telling the story of wondering who his girl will choose - him or the other guy. Can't remember the name of it. It builds and builds, the story and the music. Then at the very end - the very last phrase - Roy's voice lifts towards an impossibly high note - not even sung in his usual falsetto, but in his deeper, chest voice - and you're thinking 'is he gonna hit it?' And of course he does, he soars: 'She turned and walked away with me...!'

 

And that's it. He's a legend.

 

The money-shot line in this song came from a particular image, from Sian's Day 8 Care Package.

 

Next.

 

Day 9 Care Package:

 

Another white paper package tied up with string. This time pink sparkly string.

 

 

And inside, 11 photographs of the most amazing flowers - all shades of crimson and white. Are they camelias? Or a type of orchid? I'm not sure - they're growing on trees like blossoms do but they're waxy and solid like orchids. They're extraordinary things - a sea of pink and white photographed against a blue summer sky.

 

One photo captures three flowers on the same branch, quite close up. They look like sisters.

 

I remember Sian did tell me that there was one package that was just something beautiful. At one point in the parcelling process she thought to herself the things she was giving me were quite dark, in general. So she decided to also give me something that was just innocently kind of gorgeous.

 

This package is it. I wish I could feel one of these petals between my fingers.  

 

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