I have a series of photos taken in twilight at the Salton Sea that I was trying to decide how I wanted to present them. I finally decided to write a song and create a music video with the images. I took advantage of this wet, rainy, muddy Black Friday to record the song and put the video together.
Red Cape on the Edge of the Salton Sea Lyrics and Music by Timothy Price
Standing on the edge Of the Salton Sea Dancing in the darkness Destiny
Wrapped in a cloak Releasing red Wakening spirits From the salty beds
Twilight glows Off the shore Cape swirls Disturbed forlorn
Ceremony’s twilight Apparitions conjured Silhouettes dancing in the night Dusk turns on A golden somber Silence calls Ghosts asunder
My latest song is about the ever present use of acronyms in our never ending search of ways to communicate with as little speaking, typing, mousing, tapping, clicking and swiping as possible. The meanings of the acronyms are in the video and at the bottom of the post.
Acronymphomania Lyrics and Music by Timothy Price
I’m without the gift of tongues Speak in letters One by one
Nouns and verbs Cloistered like nuns Instead of words Acronymphomania
AAMOF WYSIWYG TOPCA in TAR JBOD ISAR Communication’s FUBAR
Archnymphomaniacs HAVE NO VERBS USE NO phrases
Archnymphomaniacs Puzzled looks Empty gazes
Monosyllabic KISS KWIM BLOB IOW Like a SLOB
AYSOS MIA? OMI BAD BUN SOTD BIA ISO TIA Achronymphomania
FWIW IMHO LOOK OUT FOR THE WORS Communication’s Syllabic VERSE
Archnymphomaniacs HAVE NO VERBS USE NO phrases
Archnymphomaniacs Puzzled looks Empty gazes
AAMOF WYSIWYG TOPCA in TAR JBOD ISAR Communication’s FUBAR
Since many of the meanings of the acronyms go by very quickly in the video, below are the lyrics with the meanings of each acronym:
Acronymphomania Lyrics and Music by Timothy Price
I’m without the gift of tongues Speak in letters One by one
Nouns and verbs Cloistered like nuns Instead of words Acronymphomania
AAMOF WYSIWYG (As A Matter Of Fact What You See Is What You Get) TOPCA (Till Our Paths Cross Again) in TAR (The Amazing Race) JBOD ISAR (Just a bunch of disks Information Storage And Retrieval) Communication’s FUBAR
Archnymphomaniacs HAVE NO VERBS (Haptic Audio Visual Environments Natural Orbital Ventricular Endocardial Right Bifocal Stimulation) USE NO (User Support Environment Neurotic Obsession) phrases
Archnymphomaniacs Puzzled looks Empty gazes
Monosyllabic KISS KWIM BLOB (Keep It Simple Stupid. Know What I Mean? Binary Large Object!) IOW (in other words) Like a SLOB (Super Lazy Organic Blogger)
AYSOS MIA? (Are You Stupid Or Something? Missing In Action!) OMI BAD BUN (Oocyte Maturation Inhibitor Bipolar Affective Disorder Bike User Network) SOTD BIA ISO TIA (Speak Of The Devil Ball Image Analyzer In Support Of That Is All) Achronymphomania
FWIW IMHO (For What It’s Worth In My Humble Opinion) LOOK OUT FOR THE WORS (Lazy Object-Oriented Kernel Outline Flippin’ Over Rated Technology and Home Economics Weighted Operative Risk Scale) Communication’s Syllabic VERSE (Verbal Expressions Rejecting Society’s Expectations)
Archnymphomaniacs HAVE NO VERBS (Haptic Audio Visual Environments Natural Orbital Ventricular Endocardial Right Bifocal Stimulation) USE NO (User Support Environment Neurotic Obsession) phrases
Archnymphomaniacs Puzzled looks Empty gazes
AAMOF WYSIWYG (As A Matter Of Fact What You See Is What You Get) TOPCA (Till Our Paths Cross Again) in TAR (The Amazing Race) JBOD ISAR (Just a bunch of disks Information Storage And Retrieval) Communication’s FUBAR
As a special treat for Halloween, Lane and Tristan perform “Classical Gas For Two Chairs” which involved exorcising the spirits that possess our counter stools. Lane is First Chair and Tristan is second chair. I added a percussion track and an “on-hold”, “elevator”, Muzak-like track for counterpoint. Happy Halloween!
I recorded coyotes yipping and howling in the bosque and wrote a song to go with the canine chorale. It was dark when they went off on their bosque flashmob; however, whenever the coyotes start yipping and howling right at sundown we never see them as they are hidden in the brush and undergrowth in the bosque. The coyotes do flashmob howling quite often, and they sound close and often howl from all sides. I don’t have videos of coyotes; therefore, I used photos I’ve done of coyotes, plus videos of me and the guitars I played on the song.
About the guitars. I finished building the Black Tele last week. I built it with standard Tele pickups, so it has a nice twangy sound to it. The blonde jazz guitar is a Guild A-150B with a DeArmond Rhythm Chief 1000 floating pickup.
COYOTES Lyrics and Music by Timothy Price
Coyotes howling in the night Canine chorus Offers up a fright
Binomial chorale Reverbs through the trees Like a bosque flashmob Surround sound and for free
Dusk falls Latrans he rejoices Yipping, screeching, howls A cacophony of voices
Chile season is upon us. We put up a sack a green chile from Wagner’s Farm here in Corrales this afternoon, and while we were waiting for the them to steam after bringing the freshly roasted sack of green chiles home, I got inspired to finish the music video for my Capsaicin Cub song. The video is meant to be funny, so some aspects are a little different.
Below is a photo of the chile guitar and chile bass I used in the video. They are built by Dean, but I had a photo of chiles printed on a skin by Curtis Osborne at The Village Printshop here in Corrales earlier in the year, and we stuck the chiles skins on the guitar and bass. I got the guitar and bass on eBay at very good prices; therefore, I was expecting to use them mainly as props. As it turned out, the guitar and bass are very good instruments. I played the chile guitar on the recording of Capsaicin Cub used in the video, but Ron Blood played the bass line using his own electric bass guitar. However, I have played the chile bass on many of the recordings I have posted this year.
After pealing, cutting off the heads, and removing the seeds and veins from the green chiles, we normally put them in quart-size Ziploc bags, flatten the bags and freeze them. Since we have a lot of recipes that take three quart-size bags of green chiles, we decided to freeze some of the chiles in gallon Ziploc bags with the same amount of green chile as three quart-size bags in each gallon bag.
The Conservancy tore the beavers’ dams out of the clear water ditch again. As you might imagine, the beavers are upset. The Angry Beavers asked the AWB to post “Bite ‘Em On The Old Shin Bone” again to remind everyone about how unjust the Conservancy is destroying the beavers’ hard work. Let alone messing up the ecosystem the beavers create with their dams.
Oriented strand board (OSB) is made using heat-cured adhesives to press together irregular shaped wood strands, oriented in crisscrossed layers into sheets of engineered boards. While OSB is used heavily in building construction as an alternative to plywood, it works well for most woodworking projects that require sheets of wood. OSB is not as pretty as plywood (plywood is made from sheets of veneer glued and hot pressed together in cross laminated layers), however, OSB has the advantage of being very consistent with little or no gaps or voids in the finished sheets of engineered wood (plywood often has gaps, voids and soft spots).
Not many people would consider OSB a suitable material for a guitar; however, Jimmy Smith of the StratAcademy thought otherwise. Jimmy built a Stratocaster style electric guitar that is 100% OSB except for the hardware, e.g., tension rod in the neck (used to adjust the neck), frets, bridge, nut, string guides, machine heads, pickups, volume and tone controls, switch, jack, strap buttons, and strings. Jimmy’s OSB Strat is beautiful and it sounds great.
Jimmy said that he’s not the first luthier to build a guitar using OSB, but in videos he had seen of OSB guitars, the builders did not play them, so he had no idea of how they sounded or played. Since Jimmy didn’t want people having to ask “Well? What does it sound like? How does it play?”, he made a video of himself playing his OSB Strat; therefore, not only do you get to see my photos of it, you can watch the video to hear how it sounds and see how it plays.
Today’s video is original music I wrote using a prayer by fellow blogger Michelle Marie for the lyrics. On December 7, 2018, Michelle Marie posted Still… Small… Voice on Tell Me About Itat https://tellmeaboutit.co/2018/12/07/still-small-voice/, and I had a feeling there was an issue with her daughter, Alex, who has serious health problems. I commented that her prayer was beautiful, but sad, and asked how Alex was. Michelle Marie responded that she had been very sick and in ICU the week before. Michelle Marie mentioned that Alex just wants to lead a normal life. I could certainly relate to that having had a lot of health issues myself over the years. I didn’t realize the gravity of the situation until Michelle Marie emailed me with details. Alex almost died.
After getting the full story, I was inspired to write a song using Michelle Marie’s prayer for the lyrics. I was trying to imagine what is was like for Alex to be in ICU clinging to life, and started working on creating an etherial lullaby. I finished recording the song on December 15, 2018, and sent it to Michelle Marie. When I learned that she plays piano, I transcribed a short version of the flamenco guitar into piano and sent her the sheet music. She sent me images to use in a video, but I had to think for a long time how to do a video to go with the music. I finally came up with what I believe is a suitable video. Here’s my version of Michelle Marie’s Still… Small… Voice.
Off Center & Not Even 