As with most parodies, Purple Stain started out to be humorous. However, the lyrics took a turn toward the more serious aspects of life. Purple Stain was inspired by Holly at House of Heart in the Fall of 2020 when we were commenting back and forth on images and poetry. I thought for a long time about how to do a video to go with the song. I finally worked it out.
Many of us don’t fit “Normal” as defined by Miriam Webster*:
Conforming to a type, standard, or regular pattern: characterized by that which is considered usual, typical, or routine.
According with, constituting, or not deviating from a norm, rule, procedure, or principle.
Approximating the statistical average or norm.
Generally free from physical or mental impairment or dysfunction: exhibiting or marked by healthy or sound functioning.
Not exhibiting defect or irregularity.
Within a range considered safe, healthy, or optimal.
For we who have fallen outside almost all of the above definitions of “normal” at one time or another throughout our lifetimes for various reasons that are often outside of our control, we have dealt with “normal” people who do not understand the issues surrounding the problems we have had, problems we have to deal with continually, and the problem of being different and trying to fit into a “normal” world.
Purple Stain By Timothy Price Inspired by Holly Rene Hunter
Cleverly we put off until tomorrow Wearily the things that make us go insane Fondly running into the waves and splashing Fondly raising our glasses, waking with a purple stain
Purple stain, Purple stain Are we insane? So insane Purple rain, Purple stain
So here we are scrubbing and washing out that purple stain.
Forever longing wanting to be like others Our sensitivities make us like the strangest friends Unfortunately we feel our sensibilities are plundered Again the same our glasses raised as we pretend
Purple stain, Purple stain Are we insane? So insane Purple stain, Purple stain
Funny how we see, we see how things are changing purple stain
You and I we need to live as two Look! Something new That time we had to greet her She stared at us like we’re insane I thought you were going to lose it As it was all about it was all about our purple stain
Purple stain, Purple stain Are we insane? So insane
Yeah!
Let’s get us out of here purple oh the pain Walking hand in hand
We only want, we only want our sanity
We only want our sanity
Storm clouds built up in the early afternoon, with a constant rumble of thunder as the clouds rolled in. I took the above photo at 1:30 pm and the temperature was 81ºF (27.2ºC). Thirty minutes later the clouds pelted us with hail and heavy rain that lasted for thirty minutes or so. The temperature fell to 55ºF (12.7ºC) in a matter of minutes. Needless to say, our poor peonies got beaten up by the hail.
I am super excited about this collaboration between Resa at Graffiti Lux Art & More and ArtGowns, and me. Resa mentioned that the construction project to replace the 130 year old sewer lines that run under the street in front of where she lives in the old area of Toronto, Canada goes on “all day and all the night through!” I told her that would make a good parody. Resa wrote the parody lyrics to go to All Day And All Of The Night by The Kinks. I go the music and recorded the first round with my vocals. I sent the music to Resa and asked her to try singing her parody. When she sent me the audio file of her vocals, I was like “Wow!” she sounded super good. I mixed her vocals in with the music, Resa sent me video clips and photos of the construction from her window, and I put the parody music video together. Laurie was reviewing the video and she thought there needed to be more desperation in the chorus, and asked if I could add construction sounds to the chorus. I pulled the scraping sounds off a backhoe video and added snippets of the scrapping and clanking to the chorus and solo. That was enough to give a better sense of desperation to the parody.
When Resa first told me about the construction I really felt sorry for her. When we lived in Madrid, Spain, the city constructed a new Metro stop about 100 feet from the apartment building we lived in. The construction noise went on 24/7 for a year. It was horrible. However, we were not in lock down, and so it was easy for us to simply go to parks, museums, and bars to get away from the noise. Toronto is still locked down with stay at home orders, so Resa cannot simply say the heck with it, go out and get away from it all. She can go on walks, but she is very limited in her activity under the lock down orders.
ALL DAY AND ALL NIGHT THROUGH By Resa McConaghy
Oh they have got loud work to do in the day time Evac, jack hammers and backhoes too, all the night through There is no time nowhere to hide losing my mind too It’s cruel they pound and crash then roar all of the time
All day and all night through All day and all night through All day and all night through
I believe this crazy work will always be there Oh yeah all day and night time through – PTSD There is no time nowhere to hide losing my mind Evac, jack hammers and backhoes too, not a good time
All day and all night through All day and all night through
Oh go away
I just know that they will be here forever Oh yeah all day and night time through, fixing the sewer There is no time nowhere to hide losing my mind Oh they have got loud work to do in the day time
All day and all night through All day and all night through All day and all night through
I finished recording a new original song on Sunday. Gabriela at Short Prose Blog, asked me if I was going to send her a poem, so I sent here Canonical Day, and told I had been working on the music. She wanted the song also, but didn’t say for what reason in her replies. Now that I have the computer I use for recording back, I checked to see where I was on the song. I had gotten the “Ticktock” sound for the clock created and that was it. I spent most of Sunday recording and assembling tracks. Tonight I added a little bit of synth to the recording after Marina mentioned she would probably add synthesizer. I had done a lead guitar track, but decided it detracted too much and took it out. The synth I added is subtle and it seems to work.
In case you don’t know what a Canonical Day is, it’s the liturgical hours of the day defined as follows:
Vigil – eighth hour of night: 2 a.m. Matins – a later portion of Vigil, from 3 a.m. to dawn. Lauds – dawn; approximately 5 a.m., but varies seasonally. Prime – early morning, the first hour of daylight, approximately 6 a.m. Terce – third hour, 9 a.m. Sext – sixth hour, noon. Nones – ninth hour, 3 p.m. Vespers – sunset, approximately 6 p.m. Compline – end of the day before retiring, approximately 7 p.m.
The poem came to me while I was listening to a lecture on theology. I was thinking, while monks get up at Vigil or Matins to pray, I get up at Matins to pee in a nightly Vigil after the kitties have stomped across my bladder. That gave me the idea to write a poem using the Canonical Hours based on a general day in a life. The poem has one or two Canonical Hours per verse, or perverse, depending on how one wants to look at it. After I got the verses down, I decided to add choruses and make a song out it.
I’m happy I took the time to record the song on Sunday as Gabriela has good intentions for both the poem and the song.
Canonical Day By Timothy Price
Bombed at Vigil kitties in the night Matins listens Owls Hoot under moon’s light
Lauds wakens Dawn Throw off covers Spread colors Reds, pinks, yellows Tugs on sun lights blue skies
Primetime rise Face another day Lost in ironic phases Teeth comb hair Sad and pretty faces
[Chorus] Sacred routines never fail Hundreds, ten, thousand times Begins each day a blessed right Immortality of the whole
[RAP] Terce it all coffee’s cold Virtual whistles blow Tap on keys, boxes packed, Phone music Plays on hold
Sext at last Satisfies Food fantasy Peanut butter tofu chicken Thirty minutes of ecstasy
Nones dear coffee’s cold Eyelids weigh a tonne Ninth hour sleepy time For Heaven’s sake stay awake
[Chorus] Sacred ways never fail Hundreds, ten, thousand times As each day goes by some insane Immortality of the whole
Vapors rise at vespers Dinners hot-cold served Debates circles tables World made right For an instance
Compline pulls on covers Sun tucked in welcomes night Bedtime lost videos play Medianoche greets another day
[Chorus] Sacred darkness never fails Hundreds, ten, thousand times Conjures spirits Ether Immortality of the whole
Spunk @ Compline
As a dry and dusty storm blew in this afternoon, the temperature dropped from 82ºF to 59ºF from one hour to the next. The sun managed to throw a slight bit of red on the clouds at the horizon as a last hurrah before slipping into to its sunny slumber.
The moon got a sepia tone from the thin layer of clouds catching what color they could from the setting sun.
We finally got Laurie’s new MacBook Air M1 so I could have my MacBook Pro that I use for recording back. The first thing I did after I got Laurie’s new M1 set up yesterday was to go into the studio and re-record the lead guitar parts and cleaned up some parts with the bass and rhythm guitar where I was out of compás in Wood Duck Daze. Then I put the new track with the video. I think there are still one or to rough spots, but overall it’s much improved and the lead guitars are really wild like those crazy Wood Ducks.
Tabatha Towhee gave us her rendition of Habanera from Carmen by Bizet.
Bravo! Bravo! Tabatha Towhee.
On the flip side.
Well done Tabatha.
Major Tom Peepers and Mona Lisa.
Lizards looking for love. The male, above, was chasing the female, below. He was doing a bobbing lizard dance for her.
Larry Lizard
Lorena Lizard
All three owlets snoozing.
Altisimo in profile.
America
Mama Owl
Lady Banks in her massive Glory.
Honeysuckle
Mona Lisa and Major Tom Peepers. Sleepy is, you guessed it, sleeping.
Lilac
A pearlet on Marina’s Incognito Pear Tree.
Mona Lisa and Major Tom Peepers posing.
“Hey Mona. I think we need to get that stupid Paparazzo to build us a shade structure.”
Life’s Habit Music: Jefferson Airplane Lyrics: Timothy Price
One bill makes you wonder And one Bill makes you sad And the bill for the electric Only makes you mad Was in Corrales When I took the call
When climbing walls becomes a habit And there’s no paper in the stall You dream of hula and smoking hot chicks You have nothing left at all To call Corrales Where I take my calls
You see those men on the surfboard Hang ten got it all on GoPro They crash and burn like Max Headroom Now their moving very slow Was in Corrales I had seen the show
Sympathy nor restoration Dialog cut off is dead And the dark nights reel us backwards And feeling mad about what’s ahead Remember simple words you said “Try peace instead, try peace instead”
I recorded the music for Loki’s Beauty Rest in 2018. It’s a parody of Jethro Tull’s Locomotive Breath. I’ve been thinking about how to do a video for the parody for a long time, especially what to do with the long introduction and the meow meow solo. I finally came up with what I thought are decent solutions. Parody Lyrics at the end of the post.
In the bustling catness Loki needs his beauty rest He’s the all-time snoozer Awakened nonetheless
Oh, I hold the dish a scraping Tie hanging off my brow Spunk’s playing with the candle And Loki won’t stop snoring No, he won’t come down No, he won’t come down
He sees those pens to knock off From the table one by one He doesn’t have to pretend In bed he’s having fun
While I’m standing in the corridor Cameras hanging on my knees Spunk’s playing with the candle And Loki won’t stop snoring No he won’t come down
[meow meow solo]
He hears the Spunk a howling Killing lids as he calls Silver the all-time whiner Has gone and lost his balls
Oh, he licks his ridiculous rival Both lying in the sun I think Spunk’s playing with the candle and Loki won’t stop snoring No, he won’t come down
No, he won’t come down No, he won’t come down No, he won’t come down No, he won’t come down No, he won’t come down
This video goes out to Brian who has the Wildlife Intrigued blog. Although Brian’s photography is exemplary, he has more than once mentioned having some fear and mistrust of felines. Spunk, the Wild Cat, will certainly confirm Brian’s suspicions. However, we cannot assume all cats are alike based on Spunk’s behavior.
As you can see from the photo below, Spunk helped me put the video together and approves the content in the video. He certifies the authenticity of all his wild catness depicted in the above video.
Wild Cat Parody Lyrics: Timothy Price Music by The Troggs
Wild cat You stomped my heart flat You make everything scary Wild cat
Wild cat, you know I want you To lie on my lap and purr So come and curl up alright? I want you
Wild cat You stomped my heart flat You make everything scary Wild cat
Wild cat, why did you claw on me? I know I petted your fur Please don’t kill me alright? You’re toothy
Wild cat You stomped my heart flat You make everything scary Wild cat
Go on, go on, wild cat. Oh don’t shake your tail. Oh please? Don’t shake your tail! Oh! You shook your tail!
I made this video in 2017 with some really bloody awful vocals. I just recorded a new vocal track and updated the vocals so now they are just plain bloody awful.
Silver: “Ah! Oh my! You had to remind me!” Loki: “It was a sad time for both of us. I got blackballed or de-blackballed on the same sad day if you recall.
When he was a young cat He had big silver balls He laid out on the counter On display to one and all Ain’t seen nothing like them In any amusement hall
So guess what the vet did? She cut off his silver balls.
He laid there like Adonis He licked his silver things Feeling proud and smug He always kept them clean His pride and intuition He showed them off to all
So guess what the vet did? She cut off his silver balls.
He was a big balled wizard But with an evil twist The big balled wizard he lost his catliness
Why did we have to do it I don’t know His balls they looked so good
He didn’t have no distractions Didn’t care about buzzers and bells Surgery lights were flashing He thought he was in hell Doesn’t want a replay He never saw them fall
So guess what the vet did? She cut off his silver balls.
So we had to take on the big bally king We just took away his big ball crown from him
When he lays out on the table He doesn’t get no rest He’s cute when he’s all sprawled out You can see he’s lost his best His tail’s like a crazy weiner He never saw them fall…
So guess what the vet did? She cut off his silver balls.
Inspired by No Comment… #9 by Anakreon Kanavakis above. Lyrics by Timothy Price. Music by The Beatles.
The above sketch by Anakreon Kanavakis brought back memories of growing up during the Cold War when Mr. Kanavakis drew this sketch. The doctrine of Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) was all the rage for waging a Cold War. MAD is the theory of deterrence based on the idea that if enemies have equal abilities to annihilate each other, the equilibrium will deter said enemies from launching nuclear strikes against one or the other. The proliferation of bombs and missiles was a constant source of fear and concern during the Cold War which Mr. Kanavakis illustrates so well in his sketch.
Keep in mind that Athens, Greece, where Mr. Kanavakis worked for newspapers, is much closer to Russia than the United State. I will dare to guess that the fear of annihilation from the Soviet Union was more poignant in Greece than in the USA at that time, yet doomsday seemed to be always at hand everywhere.
When I saw Marina’s post with No Comment… #9 on her anmar blog, first thing this morning, I commented with the first few lines that came to mind. Soon after that I wrote the rest of the lyrics and turned the initial inspiration into a complete parody called Lovely Missile’s Garden (lyrics at the end of the post) to the music of Octopuses Garden by The Beatles. When inspiration strikes, I take action before the inspiration slips away. After writing the lyrics, I found an instrumental version of Octopuses Garden. Between various chores, I recorded the parody and sent it off to Marina for her approval and permission to use No Comment… #9.
I took this photo yesterday. It seems fitting for today’s theme.
On April 9, 1999, after President Clinton dropped bombs on the Serbs without informing Russia, Russian President Bois Yeltsin threatened to nuke Europe. We lived in Madrid, Spain at that time and saw Yeltsin on the news making his threats. It made me think of Nikita Khrushchev’s “We will bury you!” statement in 1956 (I was not born yet). We were worried about the whole affair, but all our Spanish friends were “Meh!” Some of our friends had done their military duty with Russian troops and said that most everything the Russians had was broken down and didn’t work. They didn’t think the Russian’s bombs were capable of exploding.
I like to be, watering bombs you see In a lovely missile’s garden in the shade I know I’d win, because I’ve been Watering missile’s garden in the shade I have no friends who want to be Watering my missile’s garden with me
I like to be, watering bombs you see In a lovely missile’s garden in the shade
It would be warm (Oh so warm), from the storm (From the storm) A little blast-a-way and big shock wave (Boom! Boom!) No resting our heads (Our heads), we’d all be dead (Oh no!) A missile garden will make our grave (So sad!) We would not sing or dance around Annihilation would be profound
I like to be, watering bombs you see In a lovely missile’s garden in the shade
Without a doubt (No doubt!) we’d be blown about (All about!) Echoes fall beneath the blasting waves (So many waves!) There’s no more Joy (Killed Joy), no girls or boys (No girls or boys?) Knowing there’s nothing left but empty space (So much space). No happiness for you and me No one left to tell us what to do
I like to be, watering bombs you see In a lovely missile’s garden in the shade
I like to be, watering bombs you see In a lovely missile’s garden in the shade
Off Center & Not Even 