After reading a short piece about Russian soldiers riding motorcycles toward the Ukrainian forces, running over mines, getting shot by drones, and Ukrainian soldiers, I wrote a song and made the above music video about it.
Spunk is shocked
Teagan’s vocals on White Rabbit are flawless. Click on the image to see her video.
Teagan is celebrating her birthday with a tribute to Grace Slick by singing a cover of Jefferson Airplane’s White Rabbit, the iconic song based on Lewis Carrol’s Alice in Wonderland and associated stoies set to a relentless Spanish Paso-doble (Spanish march) rhythm. It is probably one of the best known songs from the psychedelic 60s.
I was nine or ten years old in 1968 or 1969 when I first heard White Rabbit played on a local radio station. Not being an avid Lewis Carroll reader at the time, I had no idea what the lyrics were about other than tripping. I actually thought it had something to do with Arlo Guthrie’s Alice’s Restaurant, which was released in 1967 a few months after White Rabbit, but I had heard Guthrie’s album before I heard “ White Rabbit” played on the radio.
White Basket
After I finished intensive chemo in 2010, I complained to my oncologist about not having feeling in my fingertips or toes. I asked when the feeling would return. She said probably never. I gave her a disappointed look and grumbled about it. She said, “It’s better than the alternative. Stop complaining, you’re still standing above the ground!” She was right. I had no right to complain. She had saved my life, and following her instructions, I never got sick or had any complications that I’d heard so many people had with chemo. After my second bout with cancer, and even more intense chemo than I had with the first bout, there was no chance of regaining much feeling in my fingertips.
As one might imagine, playing the guitar with numb fingertips is challenging. I started relearning to play the guitar in 2018. I wrote the lyrics to Standing in 2019, but never got a tune or music worked out that I liked. I gave AI Music the lyrics and the parameters for the music, and I finally got a song I liked.
Søren knows what it’s like to be standing!
Standing
By Timothy Price
Verse 1
Numb and swollen fingers
Fumble on the strings
I can’t feel the music
I’m Lost in sonic spaces
Verse 2
My guitar rings in my ears
I struggle with the sound
I’m trying to make some music
A joyful noise is what comes out
Chorus
But I won’t complain
And I won’t shed tears
It’s a miracle
That I’m still here
I won’t go down
Or get torn usunder
Becase I’m still standing
Above the ground
Bridge
Errant notes dangle
Then they Fall
Slipped off strings
And fingerboard
They lie scattered
Across the floor
They’re silenced
Under foot
Otro
Numb and swollen fingers
Still fumble on the strings
I still can’t feel the music
I’m still lost in sonic spaces
TnT’s latest musical collaberation is a version of Moments I made for Teagan. While I was trying different animations for the video, Teagan created a happy image of a singer and musicians for me to animate. Of the many problems I encountered creating animations for the a video to go with the song, the main two issues were 1) getting a consistent singer and musicians through the entire video, 2) syncing the singer’s mouth to the lyrics.
Using Teagan’s image, I was able to keep the singer and musicians the same all the way through the video. I gave AI the lyrics and incuded timing and prompts in attempts to sync the singers mouth with the lyrics. I do not have an AI subscription that allows me to upload the music in an attempt to sync the music with the animation, so I have to do a lot of trial and error to get things synced up the best I can. I got the mouth syncing moderately close to the words in the video, but they are still off.
I know a lot of people don’t like AI imagery and animation and are put off by it. However, it’s getting better all the time. It also gives artists like me and Teagan a way to create images and animation that we could not afford to do in the traditional ways of creating images for animation and video, or paying someone else to do it for us. Teagan has really polished her use of AI to create images, and I am getting better at the animation for video. We are really psyched about the possibilities that lie before us.
Dawn
Lyrics and Music by Timothy Price. Vocals by Teagan Riordain Geneviene.
I reworked the melody and music for A Blue Psalm that I wrote several years ago with the help of AI to create My Voice Goes Unheard. I had Teagan, at Teagan’s Books, in mind to sing it for me, and she graciously agreed. The song works much better with Teagan’s vocals.
First Butterfly
Dreaded DST 2025. Lyrics: Timothy Price. Music: Timothy Price with AI. Vocals: AI T&T.
My annual song for changing to daylight saving time. I used AI to generate the music from my lyrics based on my guidlines for the key, style, meter where to place vocies, etc. I also had AI create voices for me and Teagan, and named our AI duo “AI T&T.” I used AI to create the images and used AI to animate the images for the video.
We’ve also been having weird weather that doesn’t play well with my joints on the eve of the dreaded DST.
Teagan is warning young lovers, Tim and Laurie, to escape from the sinister circus before they too become a whiter shade of pale — Teagan Riordain Genevien.
Teagan had the idea for her and me to collaborate on a Halloween-themed music video. We chose “A Whiter Shade Of Pale” by Procol Harem. Teagan produced wonderful images of herself, Laurie, and me for me to use in the video, and she sounds great, as always. She wrote a really cool story to go with the video that you can read on her accompanying post at https://wp.me/p30Tpb-9R4.
Halloween Kitties
N
Nightmare on Elm Root Road
Reincarnation
Newborn into an elm root
Got mauled by a dog
Social Disease is on Elton John’s Yellow Brick Road album, released in 1973. While I never drank, smoked, or did illegal drugs when I was a teenager (and still don’t), I loved Social Disease because I could relate to it as my peers thought I was a weirdo. Many teachers and principals told my mom I would grow up to be a no-good-for-nothing social disease. I never rebelled against my parents. I didn’t need to. They left me alone to take care of the animals and the house and irrigate the property through my teen years. But I rebelled against authority and public school. I hated both with a passion.
Loki: “Reach out and touch someone with a social disease!”
Breast Cancer Rose
Marble: “Where’s the cheez?” Loki: “Concetrate hard!” Silver; “¡Milagro!”
Line of cats
Thunderstorm
Off Center & Not Even 