Hello! I'm starting a blog! Everyone else is doing it, I guess I'm finally catching on to the excitement. What can I say, I'm slow about these things. It's kind of like when I finally got a computer - I waited until they started selling the cute iMacs in trendy colors before I finally conceded to the need.
Embarrassing but true, and hey - it's all about personal disclosure in these electronically, practically anonymously connected times, right?
I was reading a story in the New York Times Magazine about the new paradigm for up and coming musicians: basically, mystique and glamour are passe, it's all about access, baby. It's up close and personal. It's intimate. Here I am, entertain you.
Speaking of which, a lot of you reading this are probably Blame Sally fans. So I'm telling you right now - if you're expecting the rest of the gals to participate in this experiment, think again. They prefer the old paradigm. I'm hoping that if I focus enough on ME it will provoke THEM enough that they'll finally decide to dip their collective big toes into these foreign waters. As my next door neighbor Howard used to say when we were kids, Time Will Tell. And honestly, who can argue with that?
As previously promised (see above referral to self obsession), I've decided that at least in this inaugural post I'm going to talk about a personal project, one that I've been thinking about and working on for the last couple of years, though I haven't really done much in terms of final wrapping up.
But before I throw myself into that, I'll at least reveal the choicest tid-bits in the Blame Sally March to Glory. I can't resist. Last week we were Number One on XM Satellite radio's XM Cafe. (XM 45). I know you all know that because I sent out an email to everybody I know already, but it just feels so good to say it. Number
One. (followed by Amy Winehouse and Tori Amos, btw). They've been playing Severland, If You Tell a Lie and Fillmore Street regularly, with some longer 3 and 4 song spins that delve into the whole album.For those of you who are not privy to the sordid ways in which the music business actually works, let me tell you - getting radio play in commercial markets without the backing of a major label and shitloads of money is no mean feat. The innocence with which we are often approached by friends, family and fans who say - why aren't you getting played on the radio?; why aren't you being nominated for a grammy?; why aren't you headlining the Hollywood Bowl?, - it's touching, but oh, if they only knew.
I've never forgotten a long conversation many years ago with one of the VPs of Publishing for Disney Music - he loved the demo CD I'd given him for consideration, actually said it was the best thing that had crossed his desk in a year, but he felt that my "Image wasn't right" (read: you're not young enough, you're not skinny enough). 
Isn't it strange, it did seem to me that image is easier to manufacture than a good CD, but that's just how out of touch I was. He would be putting his money elsewhere. I think that was the year Britney Spears broke onto the scene. Dang-it, I should have been a Mousketeer! Hee, hee.Hey, I wonder what's happened to that guy? I'm still doing my thing, only now I'm older and, unfortunately, less skinny. Thank God for the new, glamour-free paradigm. Thank God for the more Glamorous Sallies. But enough about those beauties, back to my current indie project.
My mother, a painter, is from the island of Mallorca. She is publishing a book this month of her paintings and stories of her life - folk, fiction and memory. While helping her transcribe some of her writing I became inspired to write songs about my own feelings for, and relationship to, the Mediterranean. In the last seven years I've been to the area five times, both to visit friends and family and to perform with Blame Sally. I thought it would be fun to publish lyrics here every once in a while, and hopefully it will inspire me to finally record the 12 or so songs I've written for the collection. Here's the song that starts out the cycle of music. Hopefully I'll be recording it very soon.
Preamble (as if you haven't had enough) - in a story called "The Arrival", my mother wrote of the time she left the Island of Mallorca when she was 5 years old. The civil war in Spain had not yet begun, but it was about to. Her father was an admiral in the Spanish Navy who would early on be assassinated while being held captive on the island of Menorca. But before that nightmare started, her father was taking a trip to Barcelona and took his 2nd to youngest daughter, my mother, Pilar, on this trip with him.
She remembers the excitement of leaving Palma in the early evening, the waterfront would be crowded with families and well wishers waving off the evening ferry to Barcelona. And as they pulled away there was an awesome sense of excitement that they were going to the Mainland, to the real world. On the westward bound trip they would follow the setting sun, sleep on the boat and wake up in the big city.
But in this story, she also writes of the return trip - and that was the part that inspired my first song. The boat from Barcelona also left in the evening and would arrive to Palma with the sunrise. While visitors to the island would still be sleeping below, the islanders would all come up in time to watch their beloved island emerge in the light of dawn. In a way that seems quite unique to island people, they experienced enormous pride and love for their "Little Rock".
There she is,
rising up like the Venus
from the green, salty deepness
calls me back to her arms
like a dream
little rock of the misty morning light
of the blue sea
calls me back, calls me home
Wandered far,
followed all of my passions
lost myself in the vastness
like a wolf in the night
drank of wine
stole the fruit from the table
like a child in a fable
out of sight, out of mind
There she is
strong and sweet as tomorrow
holding all of my sorrow
like the burden is small
like a dream
little rock of the misty morning light
of the blue sea
calls me back, calls me home
