City of Legends

Survived the reading.  Both Tag (Daniel S. McTaggart) and I cut out earlier, a bit disappointed by the turnout…but as I did no local media and the store did little (they had a big fish in Senator Robert C. Byrd coming in just a few days ahead of us and we were sort of pushed aside, which is understandable, but regrettable.

I did make my announcement at the reading:  I am stepping back from doing more public appearances for the next year.  I need some time to concentrate on writing, editing and healing up.  I could tell my stamina (and patience) was diminished and I don’t like putting anything less than everything out there.

Busy week, but I will be doing updates all over the place as time and sanity allows.  One of my favourite muses is back from holiday and so that will be a boost to my productivity.  I had a pleasant birthday weekend…a few surprises, but that is part of life, you know?

Some ideas for my next book are starting to take shape…but I am putting those off and promising myself to focus on my current catalog for now.  I have a tendency to start new project while the old ones aren’t even done twitching in their afterbirth.

There is a rumour that I would like to address.  Well, several, but this is the one I am addressing today.  There is talk that with the rise of williamfdevault.com I may be selling off cityoflegends.com.  Fair point.  I can say I have no immediate plans to do this.  For more than a decade people have been coming to the City to read my works and you’d be surprised, perhaps, to see how many come back again and again, off their favourites or bookmarks.

I don’t like leaving people stranded.

I am getting responses from more photographers and models I approached for the website redesign and the response is humbling and overwhelming, in addition I have been solicited by a few who heard about the plan and want in on it.

I spent a little time today selecting the first poems for the experiment.  I have a job cut out for me, but I am going to love it.

By the way, someone pointed out that the playlist for Evangelist is a little light compared to most of my CDs and suggested another earlier hit make the cut.  I am considering the request to add either the original or an enhanced version of Eros V to the mix.  If I do it will mean Selke gets another moment in the sun, as that is her sultry voice in the background.  Nothing like good support.  Still considering it.  It is the most downloaded single I have ever produced.  I wonder if anyone has named any of the children that have been conceived out of its influence after me?

Oh, I am going to get email on that comment.

Woke up this morning humming the theme from Evangelist.  This is  good thing. 

I admit I have been emotionally dolphining over the past few months.  Am keeping my chin up for the most part, trying variations on various headwiring to recover the mojo.  It is only a matter of time.  I am nothing if not a survivor.  I have to admit that the medical advice, in the aftermath of the food poisoning, to cancel or delay substantially the tour is beating hard on me.  Keeping my drive alive is tough. 

Nothing more dangerous than me, two pawns down.  I’ve lost a queen.  I’ve come back from worse.

 The drive to see my parents (I am in to actually see my 95 year old Grandmother, who is in failing health) is always an interesting time, as it allows me buffered time to think out loud.  Usually I get a lot of thinking and writing and sonic experimentation on the 3-1/2 hour trip.

This morning was no exception.  It started as a ramble, dealing with lyrical issues on the new Evangelist CD, but then segued into an examination of my life over the last year.  A lot has happened, many events and elements I could not have foreseen.  Some gentle, some brutal.

All in all, I have come to a conclusion.  This is one of the best years of my life.  

I have reconnected with old friends I had no expectation of ever hearing from again.  I have taken public stands on the issues of the day, been recognized for these stands, and made connections with people who have the power to affect things.  I have loved openly and with abandon a woman who loved me in the same manner.  I have broken some bad habits, written some great poetry, recorded some interesting material to posterity, helped a few friends get elements of their lives in order, saved at least two lives (according to the individuals) and published a remarkable book.  I’ve learned new words and concepts, examined my own failings and picked splinters from my metaphorical ass.

There have been some downer days and strange pains, but when the scales are weighed, I have to say that if every year was as remarkable as this one, I would be the luckiest man alive.  Most people do not live as much and as well in an entire lifetime as I have lived this past year.

I thank all of you who have shared this voyage with me, from the most vocal of friends to the saddest stalkers.  From the constant to the mercurial, from the inspiring to the oppressive.  From those who will still be a part of my life next year and for years and decades to come, to those who have now passed back into the grey.  

I thank you all with profound and spiritual gratitude and wish only to say that, while I compiled a massive list of names to include here, I shall not.  Some secrets are best kept.  While I won’t lie to you, I will withhold that which would force others harm or pain.

I have some great ideas now to finish up those damn final tracks on Evangelist, and am looking forward to tomorrow with great hope, joy and peace.

I have no quarrel with any of you.  If you have with me, that is a measure of you, not me.  Being loved and respected is not a measure of a person, loving and respecting others is.

Namaste.

Louisville, KY, August 29th. Details to follow.

(Note: Evangelist is now the most used tag on this site)

In the last 48 hours I have encountered more Ghosts of Christmas Pasts than I thought existed. Old friends (and a few not so friendlies) emerging from the ether to speak of things that they felt I needed to hear, or at least they needed to say. And it is all good.

I’m not going to pretend the past year has been anything short of a proving ground for some principles and philosophies. I’ve failed on a few, won on most of the rest and am still waiting the sound of falling shoes on a couple. All in all, a stellar year, and one I will remember fondly (believe it or not).

My dear Mother is prone to say that I am the sort of person who can fall in horse shit and get up smelling roses. She’s right. I may have my dark times, usually when I am in pain of a physical or spiritual nature, but I am pretty durable and amazingly optimistic. I perceive hate, fear and rage as venoms against me, even when I am their source, and thus I don’t let them stick around long. They do their damage, I heal and hope I learned something from the encounter that will reduce the likelihood or intensity of the next meeting.

You can condemn my methods, my talents and even my results, but that merely means you have issue with them. I won’t deny I’ve screwed a few things, a lot of things, up and badly. But on the whole, if you assemble in a room the 100 people who know me best and have seen me in my broadest spectrum, I am content I get an acquittal, and maybe even a round or two of applause for the effort.

The mere fact I am right now pondering the logistics of assembling such a group indicates how daft I can be. The second sign of daftness is that many people who think they know me best don’t have a clue. And there are some people who figured me out in the first thirty seconds I knew them whom I would love to see in that assembly.

I slept badly last night, my back is sore and my neck is stiff. Pollen is driving my sinuses bonkers right now. I pulled a muscle in my shoulder doing yard work and I’m still wearing yesterday’s socks (ugh). I have to deal with the possibility of canceling my tour, or at least scaling it back, due in no small part to an 89 cent burrito from Taco Bell that almost laid me out. It’s bad when you see strips of your own stomach lining. I felt like a starfish.

But I am resolute and working hard to finish the CD and get myself in the best shape I can for touring. I am working hard on my emotional hygiene, as that will be more important than anything in my making it to and through the Evangelist Tour. I am asking a lot from myself. More than ever before.

I pondered taking a lover, but Karla, of all people, smacked me upside the head and reminded me that without the spiritual aspect, it would do me more damage than good. Of course, she’s gotten some more recently than me, says one side of me, looking to shout her down.

I got cute yesterday and made "flair" on FaceBook of all my CD and book covers, sans one which I withheld out of respect for the feelings of a few people who would not hesitate to butcher me in public if they thought it would ease their personal pain. You should, if on FaceBook, swing by and get some…and sign up as my friend, I can always use more friends, even if you haven’t yet passed the test (no one has, so don’t sweat it, I just sleep with one eye open and am tougher than I look).

My son, Elric, is helping me with the music for the final tracks for the Evangelist CD. That is exciting, in many, many ways. And, if you haven’t been over on Amomancer in a while, or don’t like the tone of the malediction poems, wait a few days and strap in…there’s something coming up that will melt the icecaps and dry up Iowa. At the same time.

That’s no typo. It was 114 degrees in the San Fernando Valley yesterday. And by reports it is that hot today.

Smelting steel on your car hood, anyone?

The food poisoning is facing, although I am left with some temporary infirmities that I am working around. I adapt, as anyone who actually knows me will tell you. I am sort of like the description that the android Ash gives of the facehugger alien after serious scientific analysis in the movies Alien:

Well, it’s an interesting combination of elements making him a… tough little son-of-a-bitch.

Barb, it has been said before…wounds are possible. Death? Unproven.

I am getting stronger. Not happy with the aches and pains and inconveniences, but maybe this was God’s way of a) making sure I did keep to my promise to modify my diet and b) get me to rest. Maybe food is now my enemy? That would be interesting.

Spent some time this morning with Peri. In fact, I have spent time with her every day since Tuesday. It has been nice. I picked up some new running shoes and got back to walking. Brutal, in my condition, but I have been easy on myself on several fronts and I am not going to hurl myself into the teeth of the world in anything less than full battle condition.

Any idea how much ice-cold lemonade hurts on a bruised stomach lining? Ouch.

Tomorrow evening I lift back to the DC suburbs. On Sunday I will complete the engineering on Evangelist and announce the final track list. Those who owed me tracks and don’t get them in by them? Screw em. Wouldn’t be the first time I’ve had to keep moving, leaving others behind. I will see if they get something into me later worthy of release, but not on this CD.

I don’t know, based on the medical prognosis, if the damage done by the food poisoning will impact my stamina for the tour. We shall see over the next few weeks.

I finished the engineering for Love is An Howling Beast on the Evangelist CD last night and tapped a text message out on my cell to an old friend who has agreed to grant me sanctuary for a few days in a few weeks. And it hit me. I said

I am less obtrusive than I once was. lost my mojo

And sent it.

Then I thought about it. I love those little quiet moment in the eye of the storm, when truths pelt down like soft Autumn rains. I had lost my mojo, that curious cultural phrase for one’s swagger, arrogance and self-confidence. Yeah, I can still throw up a good front, like a forcefield, but it is all smoke and mirrors, and I feel the pull on my emotional batteries when I do so. I wince every time I have to conjure that guy out of my pocket.

As something of a symbiote, emotionally, I only go so far from people before I feel the walls begin to cave in. For all my love of isolation, it is more an aversion to the drama that most people bring than a wish to be left alone. I feed from the emotions of those around me, even when they are negative. That’s why silence is more brutal than an insult or assault against me.

So, what now? I’m spending the last few coins of my soul on this CD and the tour, knowing that I will get some of it back on tour. Crowds generally are appreciative and vocal and there are always a few locals who want to connect with me on any of several levels. But the mojo, the swagger, is gone…dried up, powdered and blown away. That’s one of the reasons I am going to seek out the Santa Ana Winds and bathe in their ions later this year. I was supposed to share them, for once, a sort of binding of my elements of chaos to another, but even that dust has blown away. The winds have never failed me, unlike most people. Including myself.

I’ll get it back, the mojo, it is inevitable (and necessary). The question is will it come sooner or later? Pouring water on a dead plant accomplishes nothing, but I am strong enough out of habit to endure almost anything. Even exhaustion and the trickle-away of my confidence. I sit down from time to time and re-read some of my better works to be reminded that I am an exceptional writer. It’s one thing I haven’t butchered in my life. I know that the moment I see the first audience, the moment lip touches word touches air touches people, I will be reborn.

Funny, I would trade it all for the right set of lips. Or a quiet, honest corner of the universe. My mojo has a bad habit of deserting me when I most need it. But, I have been here before, overextended physically, intellectually and emotionally. Some call it madness. I call it exercise. When the muscles of all your dimensions ache and scream, it means they have exceeded what was expected of them and are even now regrowing stronger and faster.

My mojo is sitting in the whirlpool, getting ready for the next round with fate.

I don’t know why I "get" Warren Zevon, but I do and always have.  The late, twisted composer of some of the most truly bizarre rock songs in history always speaks to me.  From Werewolves of London to Lawyers, Guns and Money, the Z has a special place in my heart and consciousness.

And one of his best songs, in terms of stirring me, is Mohammed’s Radio…a song that has passed into the distance in no small part because of Western paranoia over Moslem extremism.  Well, Jihad them if they can’t take a joke.

I downloaded both Linda Ronstadt’s brilliant cover of it this evening from iTunes, as well as the Z’s live rendition.  And they strangely calmed me.  I think Warren Zevon’s self-destructive cycle speaks to me like Bob Fosse’s Joe Gideon avatar, played by Roy Scheider in All That Jazz.  I think people expect creative artists to be a bit unbalanced.  Sorry, folks, move along…nothing to see here except when the peacock is in bloom.  Aside from a tendency to blunder into really, really drama-laden relationships, I’m as boring as life gets.

I’m lucky.  I am in good health.  I still command a decent price in the marketplace.   I have three beautiful, healthy children and friends who would have my back if Hell came for me.  I tend to lone wolf it a bit too much, am somewhat gullible and take horrific risks when someone calls for Superman, but that’s not as bad as some traits I could have, I guess. 

I have decided that when I do my interview with Barbara Holmes later this month to give her a listen to the full package of the CD Evangelist, so she can write her impressions.  After her and the gentleman who has already asked to interview me for his online zine, I’m packing it in for interviews.  Everything I have worth saying I’ll say in my poetry and songs. 

Jan Innes once said I don’t write poetry, I live it.  Might as well take it all the way, you know?  This world of mumbling mediocrity needs a little more elegance and eloquence, and maybe I can’t save the world, but I can inspire one or two more voices downrange…you never know.  Too many people wrapped up in their self deceit and self-defeat.  The violence and venom of this world are not the disease, they are the symptoms. 

We are the disease. 

We need to learn to laugh at the absurdity of it all (as Warren Zevon did, when the pain of life wasn’t killing him by driving him to excess).   Judge me for who and what I am and have done, but my poetry has never lied to me, ripped me off or tried to do anything other than make life a little lighter, brighter, clearer and dearer for me and for others.

That’s the message, coming into focus, I plan to take on the road.

Guess what just came on my iTunes?  Requiem For Soprano, Mezzo Soprano, Two Mixed Choirs & Orchestra.  From 2001:  A Space Odyssey.  The sound of the monolith.

Spooky.

Free associating this morning whilst working on the guitar lines for Aubergine (be prepared to lose brain cells to a sonic apocalypse (good name for a band)) I recalled one of my favourite scenes in a film. Val Kilmer in "Real Genius" being a bit random but in the way I sometimes am. Val plays arrogant, fun loving Chris Knight in the movie…

Mitch: You know, um, something strange happened to me this morning…
Chris Knight: Was it a dream where you see yourself standing in sort of sun-god robes on a pyramid with a thousand naked women screaming and throwing little pickles at you?
Mitch: No…
Chris Knight: Why am I the only one who has that dream?

…and I smirked. Really. Any idea how long it has been since an honest-to-Arioch smirk was on this face? A while. Which means either I am regaining my traction on the scrith of life, or the alien pod people have already swapped me out for a plant-based lifeform. In any case, it was good to feel it bloom on my face.

I am going to go on vacation in July, as mental prep for the tour, and to see an old friend or two or one that I haven’t spent time with in some time. And beyond that is is nobody’s business but mine own where I will be and what I will be doing and with whom. It is time to recenter myself, with a vengeance.

Go do something meaningful, people. I’m keeping one foot in the nefarious zone for the time being, but the survival instincts kicked in. Well, actually, more like the regenerative powers…I did pretty much hit the ground as fast or faster than I ever had before.

Yeah, I know I promised I would try and keep it to two postings today, but one of my planners got back to me with a preliminary schedule of what happens after Tampa, the weekend of August 23-24.  Yikes.

This is tentative, based on collecting even some soft commitments, and one place screwing with the schedule can make a mess of it all…but this is what we’re looking at for now…and this is after the first week, which is a nut-cruncher in its own right.  Specific veues will start being released in the next few days.

I will keep everyone in the loop, trust me.  Right now, I think I want to go lay down and have an anxiety attack.  I’m looking at no days off, and some 8 hour drives between gigs, and I will probably not have an assistant or roadie this time out.  (I have developed trust issues of late, imagine that…)

Having been lured into submitting Strange…but Beautiful into a song contest, I have now decided to go out on a limb and submit a song to the John Lennon Songwriting Contest.

There’s just one teeny, tiny problem.

I can’t decide which song from my CDs (or soon to be released CDs) to submit.

Should it be

• Strange…but Beautiful? Lovely and well done…
• Darfur (Jesus Wept)? Social conscience, world music instrumentation…
• The Taste? Seductive and sweet…
• The Right Set of Lips? That would be nice…

Lord, I can think of ten others that might compete….somebody help me! If you have a strong opinion ABOUT ONE OR MORE PARTICULAR SONGS OR TRACKS, leave a comment.

In other news….finished preliminary inventory of how many and of what titles of my books and CDs will be hitting the road with me this summer. Sheesh…I need a forklift. Or a roadie. More than 200 books, about that many CDs. Yes, this tour will be the answers to many people’s prayers, as I am not anticipating surviving it. Just a question of whether my heart or luck gives out first. I am tired in ways I can’t even comprehend, but committed to one last drive beyond the point of endurance.

But I’ll be going out on MY terms. Thomas says we should call this the "Couer Rage" tour. Nope. But it would make a good title for a book.