Happy July, Julius and All


www.bom.gov.au/calendar/archive/2008/july.shtml


July is coming
It is already here
Summer is over.

That's what my grandmother always said, to be realistic and not discouraging, I'm sure.

Time passes quickly
It comes not this way again
Enjoy each second

Usually coupled with the following...

Good or bad, mind it:
This too shall pass, by its way.
Yes. This too shall pass.

The idea of a
Calendar is not simple
Research is needed.

So, born in July
Friends with Julius then, yeah?
Not really, brother.

The Who performing Summertime Blues live at Leeds

"Running Through the Jungle" - Cheers!

"Tell us. Tell us the end of the story!"

"That's for another night. Time for bed now."

"Please? Just this once?"

"Well, alright. Just this once.

     Settle down nice and quiet. That's it. You're about to hear how young Gabeldyn surprised everyone by joining the circus that was passing through the village at the very same time of the first attack from above."

"Is that the one where he comes back just in time to fix the thousand creme brulees everyone needs to save the society dinner's history of high class stuff?"

"Yes. this is that very same story. Even with the changes, the story remains the same."

"I always liked that one."


<Live at Wembley Stadium, June 2008

Dave Grohl: Vocals
Taylor Hawkins: Drums
Jimmy Page: Guitar
John Paul Jones: Bass>

Song to the Sea Turtle


Courtesty of: http://www.jenniferbranch.com/j/Paintings/16/SeaTurtleVIII.htm

Efforts to protect and rescue
Precious sea life
Are being pushed aside and stunted
Causing heartache and strife

These graceful, sentient beings
Have the right to live
They're burned alive to clear 'the mess'
Engendered by a corporation
Without any care to give.

It makes me sick to heart and bones
To hear their urgent travails
How will this be answered when
A reconciliation comes?
Karma asks its mighty question:
Returning the lesson's clarity in tens.

It didn't have to be this way
The price didn't have to grow too large to pay

Only sighs and tears now dwell
Floating on the swells
Tears where turtles ought to be
In a still-magnificent 'wild' sea.

"Everything Is Illuminated"

A quirky little movie based on the book that I have not yet read. There are gems in all the places you don't expect them. The quiet suspense and budding resolution are lovely and sad and joyous... all it should be. Yes? Yes!

Also, the soundtrack mirrors those emotions, and this is a musical follow-up from a neighboring land to the last post, but with a distinctively robust, buoyant, rebellious, and yes, explicit... tone.

To be accompanied with V, neat.  :), I guess.  (insert laughter here)

Blood searches for blood. Collectors collect. Adventurers move about the earth.

In time, everything is illuminated, secrets revealed, light shone upon dark places, layers peeled.

Cheers!

Hamlet Gonashvili

While copying out the "To be or not to be" soliloquy from Shakespeare's tour de force - one of SO many - I came across this Georgian singer of great subtlety and gentle beauty of voice. I hope you enjoy it, with chorus. It evokes in me a feeling of being far from home, but traveling with a deep sense of camaraderie all the while.

It's hard to believe there once was a time when hearing music from across the globe was reserved for the likes of singular persons like Marco Polo.

The fact that days go by when I do not acknowledge how very fortunate I am in this regard is truly shocking when I stop to think of it. What pearls and diamonds lay outside our 'borders,' if we but stretch out our arms and ears to take hold and listen.

Enjoy if you hear something that resonates...

Living on a Thin Line: Pete Quaife Passes Onward


Article can be found at permalink:
http://music-mix.ew.com/2010/06/25/kinks-bassist-pete-quaife-dies/

"Kinks Bassist Pete Quaife dies at 66
by Leah Greenblatt
June 25, 2010
@EW.com ~ Music Mix Blog:

Pete Quaife, a founding member of British Invasion icons the Kinks who played bass and sang vocals for the group from 1963-1969 and appeared on their classic albums Something Else By The Kinks and The Kinks Are the Village Green Preservation Society, has passed away at the age of 66, after a decade-long struggle with kidney problems.

Quaife appeared on the band’s early hits, including “You Really Got Me,” “All Day and All of the Night,” “Waterloo Sunset” and “Dedicated Follower of Fashion,” but reportedly left the group after clashing with childhood friends turned bandmates Ray and Dave Davies; he was replaced by bassist John Dalton (who himself was later replaced by Jim Rodford, in 1978).

Quaife went on to form the country-folk outfit Mapleoak, which failed to replicate the Kinks’ success, and ultimately earned his living as a graphic artist in Canada. He did, however, return to perform with the Kinks at their induction in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1990."

Though Pete did not play on the song, 'Strangers,' which I've included here.. its lyrics and context in 'Darjeeling Limited' seemed somehow appropriate, though not in a straightforward mention of passing on. More about those we meet along the way and the things we do have in common. We are one... traveling the road.

To Memorize By Summer's End...


There is more here than meets the eyes of ten thousand men and women. I've long wanted to memorize it and now is the time. To see all its richness - the truths and that which may be overcome. (Hail Hamlet; you did your best with many an insight to make the struggle worthwhile, though in the end, as always death before rebirth).

(The following is Courtesy of:  http://www.monologuearchive.com/s/shakespeare_001.html)


HAMLET A monologue from the play by William Shakespeare

HAMLET: To be, or not to be--that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles
And by opposing end them. To die, to sleep--
No more--and by a sleep to say we end
The heartache, and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to. 'Tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wished. To die, to sleep--
To sleep--perchance to dream: ay, there's the rub,
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause. There's the respect
That makes calamity of so long life.
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
Th' oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely
The pangs of despised love, the law's delay,
The insolence of office, and the spurns
That patient merit of th' unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? Who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscovered country, from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will,
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all,
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprise of great pitch and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry
And lose the name of action. -- Soft you now,
The fair Ophelia! -- Nymph, in thy orisons
Be all my sins remembered.

Lovely... just lovely.  At... youtube.com/watch?v=X7tM68etoD4&feature=related

... Cake

(Courtesy of Jessica.diamond's flickr.)

I remember sitting in the lobby when you invited everyone present to a wedding in the mountains. Once there and settled, you took the time to look each person in the eye, and lent your radiant power to the union. Leaving no doubt, you helped each of us to know when it was time to go as the food was not planned for so many guests. That sunny afternoon under the wedding tent is one of my living memories. I dream of it as well. The beauty of the ceremony - the stillness presiding over everything - human and companion nature at peace. The school bus ferrying folks lifted out of the ditch on the narrow driveway uphill by a small contingent of  men and women who knew they could do it on the count of three. I am not the same after each of these times, and my gratitude is boundless, for in them I have really lived with conscious awareness and joy.

And That Was The Point When Things Got Weird

http://www.reiselandbulgarien.de/foto-reise-durch-bulgarien-mit-evgeni-dinev.php

Golden light angles long, to force the gradual dim
Change has come and once again let the Gloaming in.
She walks through wall and stone and earth.
Her feet barely touch water as she skims the mirth
Out of the places we usually foray.
The Gloaming signals it's no longer like day
Same rules no longer apply
As all the color melts out of the sky.
I'm left to wonder whether that sound I heard
Could be a bat, nighthawk, or some other bird.
And that's when things get really weird,
Though it wasn't from what I originally feared.
Take heed.
Take care.
Remember the Gloaming and how fair;
What short a time she stays.
There's no keeping her from roaming
After draining away the the days.