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Dr Frank
Jul 15 2020 · 3:38 PM
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A shadow of my former self (which wasn't all that great) Well, my brothers and sisters, and cousins, and aunts, and what have you, another Wednesday has dawned. Which means Song for Odin, that thing I do where I post a video resource and comment on the song therein. And because of all this ...and the Women Who Love Them action going on lately, I figure it's worth doing another one of these: https://youtu.be/gBLmVotEh3U It's the re-mastered "Now that You Are Gone", test press pre-release. This is, by the final day to pre-order the second 150 gram pressing if you want to get the custom box and pin; that is, orders placed after today will arrive in a plain old box. See link below if you want to get in it. (The 300 deluxe 180 gram copies are all spoken for, and thanks very much for that.) So, "Now that You Are Gone," minor secrets thereof. This has long been one of my go-to acoustic interlude songs, and to this day I do it pretty much the way it is on the recording and everyone's used to it that way. But as so often, my original idea for it was much more grandiloquent. I imagined it as a big-production full-band number, with, believe it or not, ironic strings and a C note drone that started out inaudible and got louder and louder till the end when the dial would be on "pain." This was in my head as I lay on my back in a druken stupor on a grubby futon I hadn't gotten up from in days, strumming and staring at the cracks in the ceiling, "writing" it. (Spoiler alert: I eventually got up from the grubby futon, though I subsequently got back down on it, as is the nature such futons.) Of course, as even I knew at the time, that was not in the cards. I didn't have the budget, nor the talent, nor the support of my label and comrades, to pull anything like that off. Plus, we would have played it too fast and it'd have ended up as just another generic "Ramones core" thing, distinguished from all other generic "Ramones core" things only by virtue of its lyrics, which very few would hear or pay attention to. It matters very little either way in the scheme of things, but pretending for a second that it does, it's a good thing it was done the way it was, basically demo style, with me bellowing the words over a hastily laid-down acoustic guitar track. It was, like everything on this record, a rush job. I like the song a lot, but I recognize now that it's likely not substantial enough to support full grandiloquence, even of the ironic sort about which I was fantasizing. It's its best self as is, raw and direct, the narration deadpan but also on the verge of ... losig its grip, I suppose you'd say. I spent the few years afterwards wishing I'd at least managed to perform it with a bit more subtlety and finesse, and maybe I still wish that, sort of, but as I say, in the end it matters not. Just glad the song got out there in any form, as its existence outside my dumb head was all along unlikely in the extreme, like so many of the things bouncing around in there. If nothing else, that macramé line makes it all worthwhile; and the "na na na" bit works as well, and often sparks a crowd sing-along when I do it live, which is gratifying. The third verse is arguably superfluous and could have been left out without detracting overmuch; though "another chance to screw it up once more" is a fitting end, if a bit clichéd in an overall "text" that otherwise manages to treat of an entirely trope-y topic without so resorting. Them's my thoughts, anyhow. I didn't realize how good the melody was till I went through the painstaking process of organizing a finger-picked solo guitar arrangement for it a ways back. (See notes for link.) It's a pretty consistent rule that the tunes that work as instrumentals tend to be the most popular in original form as sung songs. Which is, I suppose, not all that surprising, but it's something I never thought of before I started finger-picking them, and since that (good melody is something I usually stumbled into rather than deliberately engineered, and fortunately I got lucky more than I had any right to expect.) Anyhow, that'll wrap it up for this installment. We'll meet again one day. It'll be strange and outré. And I won't know what to say. Except for hit it hard down there, smash that like button, murder that subscribe button, ring the stupid bell, swamp the comments... and, you know, order the record. If you want one. notes: -- Sounds Rad order link for the second pressing: https://www.soundsradical.com/store/p196/Mr._T_Experience_-_And_the_Women_Who_Love_Them_-_150-gram_2nd_Pressing.html -- Fingerpicked solo guitar version: https://youtu.be/bQKk_kK7hGE -- Songs for Odin playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLommF46BbnATopffORs0YkspebJHka2o_ #music #product #songs #heroin #minds
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The Mr T Experience - "Now that You Are Gone" (test press)

Hey folks, the test pressing of The Mr T Experience.... and the Women Who Love Them re-issue is in, and it sounds great. This EP was originally released in 1994 in the "CD 5" format on Lookout Records (LK 106.) The Sounds Rad re-issue (RAD-13-01) is the first time on vinyl for the full EP and it ...

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