A new song; Junior Extravaganza

I keep threatening to post a demo of the thing and keep putting it off. So here are the lyrics, anyway. Names are named; everyone is implicated. Which is, as you'll see, the point.

As many local readers will know, the Junior Extravaganza is a prom fundraiser arranged and performed annually by Juniors at my high school alma mater. I've been feeling kind of nostalgic in a creative sense lately, so this song is about some of the things that happened around our Junior Extravaganza, with, as always, a little poetic license exercised (although this time it isn't for drama; all the drama was there without any help at all from me). It also occurred to me that this could probably still work for anybody who doesn't know what the Junior Extravaganza is, as I think that phrase is a pretty apt metaphor for the horrible things 16-17 year-olds are liable to do to each other anyway.

So here's one for the 06-ers. I'm not sure you guys will thank me for it...

"Junior Extravaganza"

I had a secret Screwdriver at Vanessa's house
Made with vodka that my cousin Tanya bought for me
"Junior Extravaganza" nominal practice - son, I wasn't the only one
I wasn't the only one
Jill said that she was in love with me
But the way she kissed me, I could never have known back then
She saw the bottle, boy, and she left the house with me
I got her drinking - son, I wasn't the only one
I wasn't the only one
On stage in the school cafeteria;
The room is filled with mostly old folks that can't let go
It's hot with bodies, all the chairs and the catacombs
My heart got lazy - son, I wasn't the only one
Look there - there's a girl in a brand new light,
A budding, slutty sort of princess that can't slow down
She took the bottle to the end of the world with me
I left her out there - son, I wasn't the only one
I wasn't the only one
Cloth seats with the stains and the chicken bones;
Huge bed without a toolbox to hold us down
Beneath the stars, you'd think it'd be something beautiful
But it was not the way I pictured it before - she wasn't the only one
Drive home with no music, the windows down
Fingers smell of spit and pussy in the midnight wind
She lied and told me that she's never been touched before
Relativity, I guess - it's such a mess; "What a whore," we say
Cause it's a sin to seek a respite from loneliness;
It ain't God's will that we should all feel alive

And I will convict us all
It's criminal that no one flipped and set the prom on fire
We are the Judases and Pilates and Jesuses;
We are the victims and the murderers of our friends

Zac saw the bra through the window there
Some girls were changing, shall we say, in more ways than one
And some guys were in there, too - we said, Let's all be mature
I said I wouldn't look - I lied; I wasn't the only one
And that guy, he was never all right, you know
So he had it harder once he started to feel that burn
And wasn't it natural how we all made it harder still?
These days he's sedated - son, I wasn't the only one
I wasn't the only one
I swear, I wasn't the only one...

Expatriate post

Just an update for its own sake, really. I don't have the time to think of anything clever or interesting; I'm at my mom's house, borrowing online time because our internet has been shut down for two weeks. If it persists, I will hunt koala bears to extinction.

James and I began filming for www.pianoanytime.com today. His content is brilliant, but we'll have to reshoot everything from today because I apparently have this nigh-undetectable mini form of Parkinson's which renders me completely unable to hold a camera still. And it wouldn't hurt us to have more lights either. We need a taller tripod for sure, and we'll resume tomorrow. I hope no one who subscribes to the site ever reads this and discovers its humble-bordering-on-the-ludicrous beginnings.

But I think it'll be awesome. I really do.

Rehearsal for The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged) is lots of fun. We've had seven sessions now and are making huge progress. I encourage you all to see it; we open July 10th-ish, I think. All the information is at www.nacc.edu/nacctheatre/abouttheshowshkspr.htm

Also, my group The Clever Animals will be playing a concert with the talented singer/songwriter Ms. Katrina Barclay at the DeKalb Theatre in Fort Payne on the 24th of July. Kyle Putman's band will be there, too (are you out there, Kyle? I don't know the name of your band yet). I think it'll be like five bucks at the door, to cover our rental cost and whatnot. But we plan to debut as many new songs as possible, and it will be our drummer Ashton's first show with us. And in fact, our first show with a drummer. Yikes. Anyway, it should be lots of fun. Come out and support local art, then talk to me after the show. We'll hang out.

I've been writing a crap-ton of fiction lately, staying up all night and sleeping during the late morning and early afternoon. There's a short story called "Gold in the Hills," which is in no way about the West, or gold, or prospectors, or, God forbid, cowboys. It's set in a fictionalized version of Fort Payne/Sand Mountain, and I quite like it. If I can find a way to post it here in .pdf so nobody can get in and edit the text, I'll post a link to it.

(Christ. How paranoid I am. Why would anyone want to edit the text? But still.)

There's also a novella in the works, tentativly titled "God's Stomp." Yes, I realize the word is actually supposed to be "stamp," but as it is also set in my mythical Fort Payne/Sand Mountain area, you can imagine that regional vernacular certainly plays its part. And "God's Stamp" sounds terrible. Like a postage stamp, not a skull-crushing footfall. Which is what my story hints at.

So I'm off to work at the studio a bit, then tonight, the Campsite. Sounds great.

Ooh yeah, here's some stuff. You should see: The Hangover, Drag Me to Hell. Both worth a few chuckles in very different ways. I love adult comedies and fictional hell, so both these were right up my alley. Enjoy. And tell your friends about the shows, both of them. I'll post more often once they get our internet working again.