Once We Waltzed
This for some reason didn’t get published back in August. I don’t know how to work this thing…
Last freaking song! Yahoooooooooo! Okay – so this demo is done – and I’m writing this after the fact. But I did record some really bad video while I was working on it that I shouldn’t post but probably will.
Heidi requested something with arpeggios a long long time ago – back when i was deep into Snow White Snow. I came up with some ideas but none of them really panned out all the way. I’ll go back to some of them when I get back to SWS. But also – I really wanted to do a waltz for some reason for Southern Gothic. I just read Pale Horse, Pale Rider- and something about that book got me into a mood. It’s sort of got the Southern Gothic thing going on – actually – i just wikipedia’d southern gothic lit and they listed the author. anyway – the book made me think about southern gothic images – like old southern houses, and the photo of the foggy Spanish moss we’ve been using as a fake cover for now. And like, those old large black and white photos of striking kind of spooky southern women that hang in old folks houses out in the country. And usually when I think about where our little story takes place, I think of it as an old falling down kind of small white house out in the middle of nowhere. But for a second, I thought that maybe instead it was one of those old southern plantation houses… with the sort of dual stairs thing that come off the front porch down to the lawn. And I was thinking about the songs we already had and what hole was left. And I thought that, like in the other song Neruda Left the Room, where the guy is reminiscing about his wedding – that there might be a kind of bookend to that – where he remembers something later in their life that sort of reveals the kind of life they had. And for some reason I pictured them dancing a waltz at one of those old fashiony southern ball kind of affairs. And then I pictured her ghost dancing alone out in the yard where the ball had been and him seeing her and remembering and going insane. And then, I emailed the kids this:
so – 8 songs isn’t enough for a record – right? Help me figure out what this last one should be about and where it should go. I think it’s going to be a super simple string arpeggio thing. Here’s where we’re at – this is sort of the order I’m thinking for now- let me know if you have an opinion:
Drag the River – where the dudes girl has drowned. he doesn’t want anyone’s sympathy or help, he just wants to be left alone
Waste – where the dude looks back on things with a bit of regret at how he treated his girl and wasted time on bullshit
Cardinal S – where the dude gets annoyed at how the world just keeps going with no regard for his tragedy, continues his regret apologizing to the children she wanted that they never had, sing hosana, but no one’s there to hear him
Neruda Left the Room – where the dude reminisces about his wedding, but the reminiscing turns a little bitter at the end
Into the Closet – where the dude has put off going through her shit, and finally goes into the closet to get it done
Lions in the Woods – he’s found her old letters in the closet and has spent days and days in bed reading them over and he’s starting to go ’round the bend from misery and lack of sleep. He’s becoming paranoid and crazy as hell. He sees things all around him and knows something is going to git him. he’s been contemplating doing himself in the whole time, but now he’s getting serious. He’s kind of ready for the lions to get it over with already
Knives in the Kitchen – he’s totally given himself over to hooch and pills and no sleep and insanity to ease the pain and to bring himself over the edge. Dude’s lost it.
Leaving Ohio – where the dude leaves ohio, it’s unclear which way he exits…
and tony emailed back this:
“How about another song where it’s possible he’s responsible for her drowning? Maybe even he fucking drowned her, the asshole…”
Yeah! Good one. Course he also called me egocentric or something bastardly like that. He’s right of course, but that email was more an example of my self-grandiosity than my egocentricity. Anyway, there is a hint of the idea that the guy killed her in Knives in the Kitchen – the lines about ‘there’s a jar in the cellar, down in the dark, and when I’m feeling this way I go and stare at your heart….” like – that he’s cut the heart out of her body and is keeping it in a jar down in his cellar. i meant it as a metaphor… or did I!?
So anyway – I like it. And that went into the waltz song. The idea is that he’s remembering this ball or dance or whatever, and he’s interrupted by a knock at the door. It’s the law, and they think he drowned her. And it’s back in the day. And they’re mean. And it’s coming from another book I just read – The Fixer (which seemed like a complete rip off of some other book where i dude kind of rots in bureaucratic red tape and jail – but i can’t think of what it was…) And it’s coming from There Will Be Blood. And True Grit. Or something. Anyway – the sheriff is beating him about the head with his cane trying to get him to say what he wants him to say. the dude goes back and forth from trying to deal with this and with remembering the waltz, and with trying to remember what really did happen – and separate that from what he’s got all jumbled up in his mind. The music is mostly pure waltz. All strings – at first I was thinking that we’d have Heidi on cello and a few violins, but Heidi wants to do it all herself. I think this one will be fun for her. The last line is supposed to say that he finds a way out of it – and then the last song Leaving Ohio makes so much sense. More sense than it did a minute ago. I love it when that happens. I’m not sure about percussion. Honestly, I hear those finger cymbals and maybe some buried timpani. But the timpani is for sure over the top. We’ll see.
Anyway – it needs some work. Some bad lyrics in it – but they’ll get worked out. Here they are right now:
WE ONCE WALTZED
A knock on the door interrupted a thought
A memory of you at the top of the stairs
Your dress and an aura, the band had to pause
You smiled down on upon us all
The sheriff is twisting my words with his cane
It’s survival
Steady myself with a drink from the well
It’s survival
Always a fondness to gaze
Lover they want your ghost
Holster your gun I’m not moving
Time holds me to face you
I swear I remember you went by yourself
Walked into the river alone
I lie on the bank with my eyes shuttered closed
Believe me I wish I’d known
Bury yourself with a
With a teaspoon of earth
Every day it grows
Bury yourself with the facts through a maze
Is there anything we know
Always a fondness to gaze
Lover they taste the blood
Everyone holster your guns
I’m tired
Feed me to roses
Time
Step on the pieces
Your feet bleeding raw
Laugh like we’re fanning ourselves
Under stars in night
I remember the dance
The steps that we took
The passing of time
And since you are gone
Then so will be I
The window is open
Enjoy the really stupid video. jesus.