FoodTwo frozen burritos topped with medium taco sauce, with Brooke Bond tea (on ice)
G&LSurely this is the MFD patent. Please correct me if I'm wrong!
RickshawWent on a Karaoke ride last night with a friend and his friend. Songs sung included "Happy Jack" (The Who) and "Alone" (Heart). It was dark, so the
rickshaw canopy lights were in full effect.
As a lyricist....In yesterday's installment, Ed asked about how much musical direction I throw in as a lyricist. Well, the correct answer is "It depends on the situation", as it is with many other things. This comes up when designing and building systems. I like to use dirt terms for scalability, for example. Problem: "We need to move dirt." Some people will hope for some sort of weird, artificial universal answer that can't always be right. The correct answer isn't necessarily "Dump truck". Maybe a wheel barrow makes more sense. How much dirt do you have? What obstacles are there? Too often people will think "I've heard great things about DumpTruck(tm), so we'll go with that." So they spend dump truck money, have to pay for a fence to get partially taken down and then put back up, when a wheel would have gone through the gate, would have been easier to load and unload, less expensive, and would have completed the job in less time.
The scope of what I do varies by project, and even by song. So outside of intent (which is very important with a project like Traveler where there is a plot that runs end to end, and each song is tied to the others) I'm hands-off on the musical side of Traveler. On other projects where we'd co-write music and lyrics, the approach is much different.
Here's a song where I do have a couple instructions and worse, they're even at specific start and end points. It's called "Thirty-Eight Steps". Here's the demo, and lyrics are below (Copyright 2008-2010 Matt Long, Brock Frazier blah blah blah):
This song is to be sung by the "A Creator" character, unlike most of of Traveler which has Matt singing as the lead character called "Traveler". Matt is on this demo, though. Notice the instructions for narrative start and end, and fade start and end. I only did this on the lyrics of this track, and it is all intent driven.
Here's the lyrics:
Thirty-Eight StepsA Creator: Here are the Thirty-Eight Steps that explain it all.
The warmth in the spring to the chill in the fall.
Oh that's right, you guys already figured that all out.
Oh well, that's what Step Two is all about.
The Steps up to Six are things you know today
From sunrise and sunset to DNA
Some of your broader theories are nearly correct
Your sample sizes are too small for cause and effect
What I present on to you will explain everything
From why you are here to why you love and sing
Most of what I'll state is beyond current comprehension
But worry not, I'll engrave the words for your retention
You'll be able to rattle off the Thirty-Eight Steps explaining your history
You won't comprehend most of what you say until experiments are done
The information you will possess will advance man and set the truth free
For a guy not afraid of attention, this might be fun
So lay back, relax, listen, and I will instill everything to you
All you're about to hear is absolutely true
The information will be presented in it's entirety, and most of it is new
It'll all be easy, repeating is all you'll need to do
(educational narrative begins)
From your perspective, everything starts out as night and day
You work in the morning and later at night, you play
You relate to and feel the impact of the seasons
Let me explain day, night, summer though winter and the reasons
Far away from the earth is a star often referred to as the sun
It radiates the light and heat on which the ecosystems run
<fade starts>
The system you are designed to thrive from is based upon that star
The conditions of the planet helped us define just exactly what you are
I'm going to divide the forthcoming knowledge into Step after Step
Each one is not simply more truth but serves as a piece of prep
...that you can use to advance to the next level of knowledge
...until you reach Step Thirty-Eight where<fade ends>
(educational narrative ends)
------------------------------------------
I'll pull the <fade> and (educational narrative) tags on the liner notes, but they're present for good reason the working lyrics.
And so goes another day of lunch report!
Last edited by Brock on Thu Jun 10, 2010 12:41 pm, edited 2 times in total.