As everybody knows, I work the graveyard shift at the flower mine behind the stars, and last night on my shift I struck a crazy reservoir of purple flowers. They bubbled at my feet, obviously conscious of my presence, eager to be brought into the light. This is a metaphor for songwriting, in case anybody has the mentality of the people at the regional "arts" zine, who told me my column wasn't "believable" enough (surrealism, steeple!) and so have declined to publish it. It is a blessing in disguise; I don't care to see that story published anyway.
Impatient, ancient history.
The van is many things: library, kitchen, submersible space-dirigible; last night it was the sorting ground for a weird species of bloody flower I have never seen, and within a few hours I had a brand-new song and fell asleep with another one in progress in my hands. So I made a list and sure enough, there's an entire album of super-creepy, slow-to-midtempo numbers that are either unfinished, or finished and that's it, nothing else. And I saw the whole bloody purple thing like a garden of chaos, impervious to both civilization & machete, and.....
Whatever. The point is, I thought Wild Hearts Forever was a work-in-progress, but last night realized it was finished, with one outtake, a song called "Road Island" I wrote 10 years ago while driving unironically through, you guessed it, Rhode Island :)
https://soundcloud.com/pablosmoglives/road-island
It never occurs to me to make an event out of it, mostly I'm just glad to get the thing off my back, but maybe I'll hit up some self-important press outlets of the hipster variety to see if someone will "review" it. Nah. Too undignified. The heck widdem. It's not really me who's unbelievable, y'know. It's yr stylized Van Gogh clone on the cover, like the Rothko clones in Magdalena, NM, where I recorded most of Wild Hearts Forever. There was a postcard in the lobby of the hotel I was living in, basically a Rothko painting, except done by a local painter with a bank account and indoor plumbing. Pure derivative drivel. But they're "artists." Don't make me get all Doug Stanhope about it. Nuff said.
Thanks again to the people in and around the Magdalena Hall Hotel in Magdalena, NM, whose hospitality and friendship saved my ass in more ways than one. "Room 13 Studios" produced one happy little apple tree after all. Twisted, burnt, and covered in incendiary snow, but hey, that's how it goes. The balloon is fulla helium, time to let go and watch it float away. Happy trails, bitches :)
Listen, donate, purchase, freeload, download, reload, aim, fire, whatever yawanna do, just do it now, I need the money. Van Gogh & Rothko are dead. They're not living on in anybody's heart. It's a painting. Go to your local museum and watch it rot in real time before your very eyes. It is indeed both educational and inspiring.
Thank you very much for glistening,
N
https://nathanpayne.bandcamp.com/album/wild-hearts-forever
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http://soundheartrecords.wixsite.com/home
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