shazam

To me, a true oblation. Stones I've seen while wandering the beach, picked up and put in my pocket, and mostly forgotten about. This morning I'm emptying out my pockets, and deciding which I'll keep.

Shazam is an iPhone app that tells you the name of a song you hear playing. When something catches my ear, I scramble for my phone to find out what it is. Sometimes I remember to check it out once I get home, often I don't. But they're all saved in memory - the phone's, not mine - for later. Which is now.

Tunes I hear playing in a restaurant or shop. On my car radio, or in the middle of a podcast - there's a lot of This American Life. End credits for a film in the theatre, or from the middle of a movie I'm watching at home - judging by the date, I think I discovered my great favourite People Gonna Talk while watching Moneyball - or maybe it was on the radio on my drive home? I've used it to identify tracks on a friend's mix CD that doesn't have song credits - when there are a lot of tracks on the same date, that's usually what's going on. In February last year, I listened to Ross Porter's documentary on Miles Davis, and tagged all the songs that were played - some more than familiar, some unknown to me.

I first Shazammed April 5, 2009. Just over 360 songs in six years, you can do the math - divide it by six, then by twelve…  So I can't just go ahead and buy them all. Several I've already purchased, or had in my collection but hadn't listened enough to know what they were.  Which leaves plenty more, unexamined since I first laid ears on them, glistening on the beach. I reckon I'll have myself at least a little shopping spree, download a few that catch my ear again.

New music. For spring.

Looks like today is also the day to order Carolyn Credico's CD - I heard her sing No More Blues on CBC's jazz program, Tonic, and was smitten. It turns out you can't order the recording online, but I found her email through her website, and she's going to send me a copy. Also Project Pablo, nom de groove of my buddy Rory's middle son - sophisticate, Euro-flavoured club music. 

2015

Radioactive, Imagine Dragons 0425
Balance (Nao Pode Parar!), Bossacucanova feat. Chris Delanno 0213
Gianni Scicchi, Opera ~ o Mio Babbino Caro, Renata Tebaldi 0208
Real Rock, Sound Dimension 0125
Bags Of Blues, Ray Charles & Milt Jackson 0124
The Swinging Shepherd Blues, Jimmy Smith 0124
One Of These Days, Mose Allison 0124
Midnight Special, Jimmy Smith 0124
Cryin' Blues, Charles Mingus 0124
I Gotta Right To Sing The Blues, Billie Holiday 0124

2014

All Of Me, DJ Blazee 1203
Coney Island Baby, Lou Reed 1116
Obsession, Animotion, Richard X  1024
Hey! Baby, Bruce Channel  1024
Mr. Airplane Man, Howlin' Wolf  1021
The Hour, Valerie June  1021
Blue Train, John Coltrane  1019
Later, Louis Smith  1019
Maps, Maroon 5  1010
Osamu's Theme: Kyoko's House, Philip Glass  1009
A Season Of Doubt, Cold Specks  1007
Very Loud, Shout Out Louds  1001

Meeting In Malibu, Francia Jazzline Orchestra 0912
Frank The Handyman, Rolfe Kent 0902
I'm Going Home, Arlo Guthrie 0901
Never To Have, Steve Dawson 0709
Stolen Moments, Olvier Nelson 0705
Fade Into You, Nashville Cast & Clare Bowen & Sam Palladio 0524
Jingle Bells (Bombay Dub Orchestra Remix), Joe Williams 0524
See The USA In Your Chevrolet, Dinah Shore 0416
Who Can You Trust?, Morcheeba 0410
They Can't Take That Away From Me, Charlie Parker 0408
Such Great Heights, Iron And Wine 0406
Flyin' On 747, Kid Loco 0327

Moment's Notice, John Coltrane 0228
In A Silent Way, Miles Davis 0220
Shhh-Peaceful, Miles Davis
Circle In The Round, Miles Davis
Iris, Miles Davis
Song #2, Miles Davis 0219
Concerto De Aranjuez, Miles Davis
So What, Miles Davis
All Blues, Miles Davis 0218
Freddie Freeloader, Miles Davis
Miles Ahead, Miles Davis
All Of You, Miles Davis
Ahmad's Blues, Ahmad Jamal 0217
Yardbird Suite, Charlie Parker
Solar, Miles Davis
The Serpent's Tooth
Tasty Pudding
Night In Tunisia
Boplicity
Israel,
Jeru 0215
Love Tales, Claud Thornhill
Sippin' At Bells
Night In Tunisia, Charlie Parker
Pointless Mama Blues, Miles Davis 0215
Thriving On A Riff, Charlie Parker
Ko Ko, Charlie Parker
Street Beat, Charlie Parker
21th Century Blues, Charlie Parker
Congo Blues, Charlie Parker
Miles Ahead, Miles Davis
Fat Time, Miles Davis 0214
Iris, Miles Davis 0213

Dance The Night Away, Van Halen 0125
The Pusher, Steppenwolf 0123
Twice A Week, Larry Coryell & Philip Catherine 0112
Mushaboom, Feist 0111
I'm In Love Again, The World Famous Upsetters 0111

2013

Stream Of Stars, Jeff Lynn (American Hustle) 1229
Haunted, Dusty Springfield 1226
Tomorrow Will Be Kinder, The Secret Sisters 1226
Summertime, Chet Baker 1226
Nouveau Western, MC Solaar 1226
Crazy, Gnarls Barkley 1226
Unrequited, Pat Metheny & Brad Mehldau 1226
Lumberton U.S.A. / Going Down To Lincoln, David Lynch & Angelo Badalamenti 1226
Rosita, Ben Webster 1226
I Want A Little Sugar In My Bowl, Nina Simone 1226
Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow, The Shirelles 1226
Long Way Home, Tom Waits 1226
What Is This Thing Called Love, Mel Torme 1226
Humming, Portishead 1226

Ho Hey, The Lumineers 1202
Feelin' Alright, Traffic 1111
I Wonder, Rodriguez 1109
Don't Be That Way, Tex Beneke & His Orchestra 1106
Moonlight Serenade, Glenn Miller 1106
Daddy, Sammy Kaye 1106
Not Really The Blues, Shorty Rodgers & His Giants 1104
Father And Daughter, Paul Simon 1103
Easy To Love, Billie Holiday 1031
Third Stone From The Sun, Jimi Hedrix 0818
I Fooled You This Time, Gene Chandler 0619
These Days, Nico 0614

Part: Da Pacem Domine, Keith Jarrett / Tonu Kaljuste / Talinn Chamber Orchestra / Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir 0505
Unrequited, Pat Metheny & Brad Mehldau 0502
Rosita, Ben Webster 0502
Humming, Portishead 0501
Till The Next Goodbye, Rolling Stones 0404
What Can I Say Dear?, Red Garland 0331
Tales From The Far Side, Bill Frisell 0331
Stretching Out, Mark Knopfler 0330
Over Your Shoulder, Calexico 0330
Missing, Calexico 0330
Gypsy's Curse, Calexico 0330
I Got A Guy, Ella Fitzgerald 0330
The Last Emperor, David Byrne 0330
Sprawl, Calexico 0330
Je Te Veux, Paul Martinez 0326
The Belt Heist, Richie Buckely 0324
Le Temps De L'amour, Francoise Hardy 0319
Do You Feel Me, Anthony Hamilton 0317
Sherlock Holmes, Spark 0315
Tin Tin Deo, Oscar Peterson 0315
Smoke From A Distant Fire, Sanford-Townsend Band 0314
Footprints, Frank Morgan 0312
(Pathetique) Sonata for Piano No. 8, Children's Listening Centre Orchestra 0307
Song For Guy, Elton John 030
Traumerei, Horowitz In Hamburg: The Last Concert 0304
Begin The Beguine, Esquivel 0302
Cha-chaborro, Los Amigos Invisibles 0302
Shatter, Liz Phair 0228
Gnossienee No 6, Jan Kaspersen
Tuff Luck, Seam 0226
Whispering, Henri Rene 0226
Champagne And Quail, Henry Mancini 0222
Red House, Jimi Hendrix
I Wish You Love, Friends of Dean Martinez 0208
Bang Bang, Sonora Carruseles
Gnossienees: No. 1, Anders Miolin
Stretching Out, Mark Knopfler 0131
Groovin', Booker T. & The MG's 0130
Fuquawi, Booker T. & The MG's 0130
Heart Of Stone, The Rolling Stones 0130
Jessica, They Might Be Giants 0129
Royal Blue, Henry Mancini 0128
Susan, Country Joe & The Fish 0127
End Credits, Ned Rifle / Phillip Reed 0126
We're Going To War, Mark Knopfler 0126
Gnossienne No. 5, Jan Kaspersen 0126
Stretching Out, Mark Knopfler 0126
5 - 4 = Unity, Pavement, 0116
Viva Tirado, El Chicano 0108 TAL
Ausencias, Astor Piazzolla 0107
Powerhouse, Don Byron 0107
Susan, Country Joe & The Fish 0127
Theme From The Tiki Wonder Hour [Combustible Edison], V.A. 0107
My Sweet Potato, Booker T & The MG's 0105
Still D.R.E., Snoop Dogg / Dr. Dre 0105
Coffaro's Theme, Bill Frisell 0105
No Sunshine, DMX 0105
Dance 8, The Philip Glass Ensemble 0105

2012

Yesterdays, Miles Davis 1228
The Lyon Game, Phono-Comb 1223
The Lonely Surfer, Jack Nitzsche 1223
Coffaro's Theme, Bill Frisell 1223
Little Wing, Stevie Ray Vaughan & Double Trouble 1223
Cardova, The Meters 1216
Ultrafox, Django Reinhardt & Stephane Grapelli 1215
Harlem Nocturne, The Viscounts 1214
Merry Christmas Baby, Booker T. & The MG's 1210
Blues For Piney Brown, Ben Webster 1201
Afrodisia, Kenny Dorham 1114
Peel, The Coctails 1109
Heroes, David Bowie 1030
Never To Have, Steve Dawson 1025
Beautiful Things, Gungor 1021
Kuu Lei, Kalama's Quartet 1014
Terrible Thing, Booker T. & The MG's 1014
Finger Lickin' Good, Beastie Boys 1014
Theme From A Clockwork Orange (Beethoviana), Walter Carlos 1014
Perpettum Mobile, Penguin Cafe Orchestra 1014
Moment Musical, Raymond Scott 1014
Go! Go! Go!, The Treniers 1014
Nice 'N' Easy, Frank Sinatra 1014
Anything Goes, Django Reinhardt 1014
I'll Live Again, The Dixie Hummingbirds 1014
Tears, Django Reinhardt 1014
Blue Drag, Django Reinhardt 1014 TAL
Destination Moon, Dinah Washington 1014
Carnival Of Souls, Combustible Edison 1012
Pilentze Pee, Krassimir Kurktshiyski 1010
Cool Cat Walk, Angelo Badalamenti and Kinny Landrum 1006
Perdita, Rubber City 1006
Some Devil, Dave Matthews 0902
When Our Wings Are Cut, Can We Still Fly?, Gustavo Santaolalla 0902
Can Light Be Found In The Darkness?, Gustavo Santaolalla 0902
Just Ain't Gonna Work Out, Mayer Hawthorne 0823
Sabu Yerkoy, Ali Farka Toure & Toumani Diabate 0721
Tell Him, Patti Drew 0628
L'Ombre Et La Lumiere, Coralie Clement 0522
Last Kiss, Pearl Jam 0219
Don't You, Simple Minds 0204
Candy Shop, Andrew Birds Bowl Of Fire 0201

2011

Rolling In The Deep, Adele 1213
You Are Not Alone, Mavis Staples 1213
Bowl Of Oranges, Bright Eyes 1213
Samson, Regina Spektor 1213
Teeth, The Ettes 1213
Water With The Wine, Joan Armatrading 1213
Shell Games, Bright Eyes 1213
Gone To Shiloh, Elton John & Leon Russell 1213
Poor Butterfly, Coleman Hawkins 1213
Waitin' Around To Die, Tones Van Zandt 1213
'Round Midnight, Joe Pass 1213
Getting To Know You, Wayne Shorter 1213
Anyone's Ghost, The National 1213
F**k You, Cee Lo Green 1213
Study War, Moby 1213
You Wouldn't Like Me, Tegan & Sara 1213
Deja Vu, John Fogerty 1213
Down By The Water, The Decemberists 1213
Love For Sale, Billie Holiday 1213
Love Me Or Leave Me, Nina Simone 1213

People Gonna Galk, James Hunter 0925
Midnight, The Stars And You, Campbell/ Connelly/Wood (The Shining) 0830
Fly, Nick Drake 0820
I Can't Stop, Arthur Conley 0503
I'm Alive With The Love Feeling, Spyder Turner 0503
You Got Me In The Palm Of Your Hand, Donald Lee Richardson 0503
I'm Yours, Jason Mraz 0309
Hanging By A Moment, Lifehouse 0304
Little Wing, Jimi Hendrix 0304
This Is The Last Time, Keane 0304
In The Beginning, K'naan 0304
Built For Comfort, Holwin' Wolf 0304
Free Fallin', John Mayer 0304
Walk Away, Ben Harper 0304
Burn & Return, Jorgensen 0304
The Wind Cries Mary, Jimi Hendrix 0304
24, Jem 0304
The Drugs Don't Work, The Verve 0304
Maybe Tomorrow, Stereophonics 0304
Skinny Love, Bon Iver 0304
I'm Yours, Jason Mraz Feat. Jah Cure & Lil' Wayne
You Give Me Something, James Morrison 0304
High And Dry, Radiohead 0304
Sleep Through The Static, Jack Johnson 0303
Magnificent, U2 0131
In My Place, Coldplay 0131
Take Me To The Riot, Stars 0131
On The Radio, Regina Spektor 0131
Kings Of Leon, Closer 0131
The Dethbridge In Lethbridge, The Rural Alberta Advantage 0131
Crystalised, The xx 0131
Blue Yodel N.1, Jimmie Rodgers 0131

2010

Twenty Four Hours A Day, Billie Holiday 1128
Between The Bars, Elliott Smith 1128
Ballantines, Aimee Mann 1128
Islands, The xx 1128
The Modern Leper, Frightened Rabbit 1125
Naima, John Coltrane 1003
Chapitres 38 A 47, Patrick Modiano 0313
I Gotta Feeling, The Black Eyed Peas 1206

2009

Manger Throne, Third Day 1125
Can't Take My Eyes Off You, Frankie Valli 1025
Fame, David Bowie 0926
I'll Live Again, The Dixie Hummingbirds 0911
Sugar Sugar, Wilson Pickett 0705
I Wonder, The Dance Machine / ABBA 0627
Just Friends, Charlie Parker 0406
Dream, Rashaan Roland Kirk 0406
The Beast, Milt Buckner 0406
Shaw 'Nuff, Charlie Parker & Dizzie Gillespie 0406
What Is This Thing Called Love?, Billie Holiday 0406
TV Is The King, Dinah Washington 0406
Easy On The Heart, Charlie Haden 0406
Baby, Get Lost, Dinah Washington 0406
Where Flamingos Fly, Gil Evans 0406
The Big Blow Out, Henry Mancini 0406
Stoney Stret, Amon Tobin 0406
Beware The Friendly Stranger, Boards Of Canada
Dawn Chorus, Boards Of Canada 0406
A Gentle Dissolve, Thievery Corporation 0406
Untitled Guitar, Bruce Cockburn 0406
Mountain Call, Bruce Cockburn 0406
Haitian Fight Song, David Byrne 0406
But Not For Me, John Coltrange 0406
Albatross, Fleetwood Mac 0405

how to become invisible

Acquire the severed head of a man who has committed suicide.
Bury the head, together with seven black beans,
on a Wednesday morning before sunrise,
and water the ground for seven days with fine brandy. 
On the eighth day, the beans will sprout.
Persuade a little girl to pick and shell them.
Pop one into your mouth.

adapted from "Sight Unseen" 

by Kathryn Schulz 

The New Yorker

clarice's ron reeds

Some time ago I got a friend request on Facebook from Clarice Limit, a name I didn't recognize. So I checked to see if we had any friends in common. Sort of…

now playing | on the turntable this week

photos | mushrooms

photo | magritte lives

ron reed | the great canadian poem

Ashes Are Butterfly Bones Made Of Light And Dust:
God's Bones in their Wings
for Peter Norman

His bones are light,
(radiant, bone-barred):
Even the smallest bone 
in his inner ear, the bone chapel—
bone etchings,
bone song,
bone dance,
bone dream,
bone silence.

Old momma teach me nerve ends
made of juniper and bone,
bear bones and feathers,
bread and not bone;
the bone broker.

Here is a bone resembling a word;
milk tooth bane bone
seed-bone and hammer.

When the bone fragments arc to earth
the bone's song will be pulled,
descending to my ankle-bones.
The wind picks up the dust from the ashes,
the white of bone;
your bone, Morgan's bones, lean and boneless,
the jazz-loosened loose bone thing he is.

We will have only bones to hold;
the bone ash of
a red herring-bone skirt clasped with a bone button
buried among femurs and knuckle bones
where the bones 
of the child are hid.

The stone’s praise
for the sparrow’s ankle bone
rising like a frozen flood
of stone bone birds on the wing singing.

I'm chilled clean through to the bone.

by Ron Reed
with Margaret Avison, Leonard Cohen, Joy Kagawa, Lorna Crozier, Lorne Daniel, Daniela Elza, Moira MacDougall, Michael McAloran, Cassidy McFadzean, Kath MacLean, Jill Battson, Joe Blades, Louise Halfe, Ben Ladouceur, Dennis Lee, Christine Murray, Carol Shillibeer, Anne Simpson, Elizabeth Zetlin, and Robert W. Service

*

What the critics are saying;

"Cuts to the bone and then into the bone, to find the marrow." Turtle Island Native Network

"Most of all it’s felt experience, what’s close to the bone – feelings, emotions, combined with a sense of craft." Cyril Dabydeen

"The poem does not hang straggled and bone-whitened like rags in the bleaching sun. His engagement is with a burned and ruined corpse left out to dry and fossilize with its rag-remnant of torn flesh and chilled bone, an empty jaw-bone, a leaving from a physical life. Here is a victory-song for life pushing up through human-remains, detritus, stink and bone." Bone Orchard Poetry

the feast of the holy crossing

source

may 11, 1926 | tolkien + lewis meet

Eighty-eight years ago today, J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis met.

The English Faculty meeting began at 4:00, May 11, 1926 at Merton College, Oxford. The previous year, Tolkien had been appointed Professor of Anglo-Saxon at Pembroke College, and Lewis had been elected a Fellow and Tutor in English Language and Literature at Magdalen College. 

It was heady stuff; a proposal to co-ordinate lecture schedules with tutorials, the need for lessons in pronunciation and beginners' outlines of literature. Lewis wrote in his journal that "Tolkien managed to get the discussion round to the proposed English Preliminary examination."

The two men spoke after the meeting. "He is a smooth, pale, fluent little chap – can't read Spenser [Lewis' favourite author] because of the forms.... Thinks all literature is written for the amusement of men between thirty and forty.... No harm in him: only needs a smack or two."

Before long, Lewis was attending "The Coalbiters," a weekly study group Tolkien had initiated earlier in the year to read aloud from Icelandic sagas and myths in the original languages – something of a precursor to the Inklings, I suppose. A year later Lewis wrote to his friend Arthur Greeves, "We have so far read the Younger Edda and the Volsung Saga: next term we shall read the Laxdale Saga. You will be able to imagine what a delight this is to me, and how, even in turning over the pages of my Icelandic Dictionary, the mere name of god or giant catching my eye will sometimes throw me back fifteen years into a wild dream of northern skies and Valkyrie music." This experience of "northernness" was at the centre of Lewis' spiritual longing – the "joy" in his spiritual autobiography "Surprised By Joy" – which flowered into faith between 1929 and 1931, Tolkien playing a critical role.

Tolkien's passion for Nordic myth fueled a mostly secret project, the creation of complete histories, languages and geographies of the world which eventually became the setting of his Middle Earth stories. The summer of 1926 – within months of meeting Lewis – is the earliest possible occasion on which Tolkien may have scrawled the words "In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit" on the back of a student examination paper, though it is more likely to have been two or three years later. By November 1929 the two men were meeting together regularly, talking well past midnight about "the gods and giants of Asgard."  On December 6, 1929, Lewis read Tolkien's "Lay of Leithien," the essential story of The Silmarillion – perhaps the first Middle Earth story Tolkien shared. 

In February 1933, Lewis read the mostly complete first draft of The Hobbit, and it is likely that The Inklings were begun in the fall of that year. By December, Lewis's brother Warnie writes in his journal that he sees less and less of his brother every day because of the friendship with Tolkien.

Because Tolkien's journals are not readily available to scholars, we don't know that date of the following entry, but likely soon after the famous Addison's Walk conversation of September 19, 1931. "Friendship with Lewis compensates for much, and besides giving constant pleasure and comfort has done me much good from the contact with a man at once honest, brave, intellectual - a scholar, a poet, and a philosopher - and a lover, at least after a long pilgrimage, of Our Lord."