O it was lost for ever! and we found it not

Join the Mimosa's Witnesses - new facebook "church" page

2012-01-29T14:46:00.000-08:00

Now you can join "The World's Fastest Growing Religion for Ante-Meridiem Libations" on the facebooks:

A Poem in Poetry Magazine & Elsewhere, 2012

2012-01-10T12:23:00.000-08:00

A Poem in Poetry Magazine & Elsewhere, 2012
“κολεός” -Dante

The sun on the waves, in my
garden. The autumn and the spring
sometimes summer. Winter,
nature contains birds and flowers.

My grandmother’s photograph, lusterless
between pages in an old
eBook in my attic, sienna, reminds me
of the
future. I use a sesquipedalian, look it up.
Vagina.

I grow old, I grow old,
I should shop for shorter trousers.
It’s time to rhyme. The line breaks

in the mid-
dle. So much white space. Vagina.

And I did not.

Happy Boxing Day from the Manna Tease: The Fa-la-la-ing is Coming

2011-12-26T10:04:00.000-08:00

Is today the day you're supposed to get two turtle doves? Also, why is the writer of that song so obsessed with giving birds to his paramour? They're kind of messy, high maintenance pets.

I never put up this other video we shot of my one-minute christmas carol, The Fa-La-La-ing is Coming. Until it comes next year, happy Boxing Day from The Manna Tease (please "like" us on facebooks!)

Lyrics & chords to "The Fa-la-la-ing is Coming" here. Goodbye.

Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs: XXII thru XXIV.

2011-12-24T09:32:00.000-08:00

I didn't quite get caught up for the last couple chocolates of our Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs. See you next year! It's time to put away the Christmas songs until they start playing far too early in the calendar next year.

Here's three last good songs to fill in the gaps:

That's from Duke Ellington's very cool versions of tunes from the Nutcracker Suite, his Toot Toot Tootie Toot (Dance of the Reed Pipes.) (The links are to Spotify.)
This guy Dan Hicks seems to have released dozens of Christmas jug band songs, & his voice is very comforting. Here's his "Somebody Stole My Santa Claus Suit." (The version on Spotify from Hicks' album Crazy for Christmas is more mellow.)

And we'll finish this late advent calendar with the American folk song "Christmas Time Will Soon Be Over," sung here on the soundtrack to Cold Mountain by Jack White of the White Stripes. (Great album, by the way!) Till next year...

More spotify playlists & mixtapes to come! One last time, here's the link to our Infinite Playlist of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs (listen on random!)
And these days, we blog more at the simpler Manna Tease tumblr blog, where I've also been posted mixtapes & Manna Tease videos.

Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs: XXI. De Virgin Mary Had a Baby Boy

2011-12-21T14:17:00.000-08:00

Hello again - only a few days left of the Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs. This song, a traditional from Trinidad called "De Virgin Mary Had a Baby Boy" or "Glorious Kingdon," from an old Kings Singers' Christmas album, has a hilarious rhythm track. This is the only video of it:

You can hear the rhythm better in the studio version, on Spotify here. And here's our Infinite Playlist of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs (listen on random!)

Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs: XX. Christmas in New Orleans & also Harlem

2011-12-20T13:04:00.000-08:00

Quickly catching up with the Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs. Louis Armstrong takes us to both New Orleans and Harlem for Christmas:

I think "Christmas Night in Harlem" is catchier, but they're both awesome. (Is "lit up like a Christmas tree" a subtly subversive innuendo?) Here's Christmas Night in Harlem on Spotify, and here's Christmas in New Orleans. Here's the Infinite Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs Playlist (Listen on random!)

FOR YOUR CONSIDERATION: If that playlist is too wide-ranging & chaotic (& contains more than a few annoying songs) I have created a much more digestible christmas playlist centered on some albums of doo wop & blues songs: Christmas Blues, Doo Wop, & Big Band Epic Playlist (listen on random.)

Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs: XIX. Best Christmas Ever

2011-12-19T11:21:00.000-08:00

This song is better for the strange vocal stylings of Ronnie Spector (formerly of the Ronnettes & Phil Spector's prisoner wife) than for any quality songwriting:
Here's two shaky live videos from 2010:

The studio version is better & weirder, available on Spotify here. Here's our incomplete Infinite Playlist of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs (listen on random!)

Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs: XVIII. Homeless Wassail

2011-12-18T11:39:00.000-08:00

And here's the Manna Tease singing the song "Homeless Wassail":

Please "like" the Manna Tease on facebooks.
Homeless Wassail is a song by Ian Robb, but we heard it from a Christmas mix in a beautiful version by Finest Kind. The only cover on Spotify is by Broadside Electric. Here's our full Infinite Playlist of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs (listen on random!)
Lyrics:

HOMELESS WASSAIL
(Ian Robb)
"Wassail, wassail,all over the town,
Our cup is white and our ale is brown"
But huddled on the iron grate
we poor and hungry curse our fate.

No wassail bowl for such as these
No turkey scraps, no ale nor cheese,
This Christmas Eve our heart's desire
Is a bottle of gin and a trashcan fire.

Good Christian, mind, as home you go
With dreams of holly and mistletoe
That the holly bears a dreadful thorn
For those who wake to a frozen dawn.

Oh, where is He, that holy child
Once born of Mary, meek and mild?
And whither peace, goodwill to men
Now and forevermore, amen?

All ye who dine with face aglow
In Reninensi atrio (in the Queen's hall---Latin)
Pray pause awile at pleasure's door
And sup some sorrow with the poor.

"Wassail, wassail,all over the town,
Our cup is white and our ale is brown"
This cold and hunger, pain and care
Sweet Jesus Christ, it's hard to bear.

copyright Ian Robb/SOCAN

Chords as we play them:
amin G emin
amin emin/B C D
amin G emin
amin emin/B C D

C G emin
amin emin/B C D
C G emin
amin emin/B C D

Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs: XVII. Christmases in Heaven

2011-12-17T08:12:00.000-08:00

If you ask Siri, Apple's virtual assistant, "What is the meaning of life?" she gives a couple of different answers, including "42" & "Try and be nice to people, avoid eating fat, read a good book every now and then, get some walking in, and try to live together in peace and harmony with people of all creeds and nations." I think there was an article on Slate about this, where the author was touched by this practical advice from artificial intelligence. The writer was pointed out in the comments by people who recognized it as a quote from the anti-climactic postscript to the last Monty Python movie The Meaning of Life.
The scene immediately before this advice, the "Afterlife" section of the movie, contains the following strange Christmas song, imagining every day to be Christmas in heaven, complete with classic movies on television:

I had never heard this longer version that's on Spotify, which has a long coda about "Fishmas in Heaven." This verse is not in the movie: "It's Fishmas in Heaven / You are home with God. / And lot's of dace & carp & bream / And halibut and cod."

But if you need more Christmas in Heaven, there's also a soulful take on this concept, with versions by James Brown & B.B. King! Here's Billy Ward & His Dominoes:

And here's our Infinite Playlist of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs (listen on random!)

Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs: XVI. Bethlehem & Sherburne

2011-12-16T11:26:00.000-08:00

Speaking of sheep, Nahum Tate's "While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks" is one of the most frequently set texts for carols. (I've always loved the juxtaposition of the mundane "all seated on the ground" with the glory shining all around, but I suppose that's the point.) The common setting in my caroling book is by Handel, and I think there's another old common British church hymn called "Winchester Old." The version I know best is Sherburne from the Sacred Harp, & it's also one of my favorite tunes in that book. This is the great Alan Lomax "field" recording:

Here's that recording on spotify. I found several other decent versions of that on spotify, here, here, & here. I really like this medley by the Western Wind called Three Settings of "While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks." The excerpt of Sherburne is in this video:

The other setting in the Sacred Harp, Shining Star 461, doesn't appear to be on Spotify. (Will Fitzgerald has a nice round-up of Christmas tunes from the Sacred Harp here.)
However, William Billings, the great Sacred Harp composer, did set the words also, and the tune Bethlehem is published in the Norumbega Harmony. Here's Anonymous 4 singing it on spotify, & here's the Norumbega Harmony - two pretty tame versions, but still pretty. Here's a the Western Wind again:

I've also set the Tate text several times, here. & here's our incomplete Infinite Playlist of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs (listen on random!)

Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs: XV. A Buggerer's Christmas

2011-12-15T10:43:00.000-08:00

Brought to you by itwaslost's Very Special Department of Arnophilia & The Blue Myself's One Minute Christmas Carols - we present A Buggerer's Christmas.

The Blue Myself on facebooks here. More One Minute Christmas Carols.

Lyrics & chords:

A Buggerer's Christmas

Bb-dim Esus7 E7
If you see a stranger in your manger,
Bb-dim Esus7 E7
Your babe is not in any danger.
A F#min D
Ever stop to think that maybe,
Dmin A
They weren't looking for a baby?
E F#min
Fa la la, faaaa.
Bb-dim Esus7 E7
The shepherd's run in adoration,
Bb-dim Esus7 E7
Not to Mary's son, but to his barn companions.
A F#min D
We all need some warmth this winter, I feel ya,
Dmin A
'Tis the season for arnophilia.

A F#min
It's a buggerer's Christmas
D Dmin Bmin E A
All we like sheep, we've gone astray, Christ was born today.

F#min
You'll find me in the crèches.
D Bmin E A
We're rolling in the deep, we're rolling in the hay.

E F#min

Fa la la, baaaa.

©2011 The Manna Tease

Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs: XIV. Hot Christmas

2011-12-14T12:01:00.000-08:00

This year's Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs wouldn't be complete without a selection from The Squirrel Nut Zippers masterpiece & overlooked holiday album Christmas Caravan.
"Hot Christmas" is more of an instrumental, if you consider the only lyrics are "Hot Christmas / Hot Christmas / Hot Christmas." But what does it mean!?

Here's Hot Christmas on Spotify. And here's our epic Infinite Playlist of Non-Overplayed Christmas Carols (Listen on Random!)

Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs: XIII. Christmas with Andrew Jackson

2011-12-13T11:58:00.000-08:00

Another One Minute Christmas Carol for day 13 of our Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs:

The Blue Myself on facebook here. "Christmas with Richard Nixon" here.
More One Minute Christmas Carols .

Lyrics: (same chords as Christmas with Richard Nixon.)

Christmas with Andrew Jackson

In 1814 this house was burned by Limeys,
But now let’s decorate with candles & pine trees.
Let’s challenge Charles Dickens to a duel,
And use your cabin’s logs for fuel.
John Calhoun & Floride croon,
Christmas with Andrew Jackson,
Christmas with the Cherokee & the Whigs, Ho ho higgy,
The feast will have piggy, and the pudding will be figgy,
Christ was born today.
Old Hickory’s first lady was guilty of bigamy.

©2011 The Manna Tease

Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs: XII. A Five Pound Box of Money

2011-12-12T20:18:00.000-08:00

Halfway thru: Day 12 of the Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs! This is exactly what I want for Christmas: A Five Pound Box of Money. Exactly how much money is in a five pound box of it is never divulged, but if it's full of Ben Franklins, it could be a heavy load:

Here's the Pearl Bailey song on spotify: A Five Pound Box of Money. (That's a great compilation, called Doo Wop Christmas.) Here's our Infinite Playlist of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs (listen on random!)

Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs: XI. The Bitter Withy

2011-12-11T17:24:00.000-08:00

This English folk band Kerfuffle's "Midwinter album" Lighten the Dark is amazing, my favorite new discovery in this non-overplayed Christmas music project. Here's them playing The Bitter Withy live:

I love the "God Rest Ye Merry Gentleman" in that funky mode in the middle (technically overplayed, it's true.) It seems Kerfuffle has broken up & the sexy accordion player has joined the girly band Lady Maisery. Here's the spotify link for their awesome take on I Saw Three Ships Come Sailing In, & here's The Bitter Withy from Lighten the Dark. Here's our lengthy spotify mix Infinite Non-Overplayed Christmas Playlist (listen on Random!)

Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs: X. The Fa-la-la-ing Is Coming

2011-12-10T17:13:00.000-08:00

This song speaks for itself: The Fa-la-la-ing is Coming!

The Blue Myself is on facebook here.
Lyrics & Chords for THE FA-LA-LA-ING IS COMING:

Dmin Bb
Remember, remember
F C C#aug Dmin
The fifth of November used to be November,
Bb F
But November is the new December
C C#aug Dmin
Did you hear a bell from a sleigh?
Dmin Bb Dmin
It’s coming, it’s coming! The fa-la-la-ing.
Bb
The fa-la-la-ing is coming.
F C
Ba-da-boom ba-da-bing,
C#aug
Christ was born today.
Dmin Bb F C C#aug
Fa-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la
Dmin C
It’s the fa-la-la-ing for sure,
Bb
It’s clawing at your door,
Amin
It’s sawing thru the floor.
Gmin
It’s gnawing with its den-ture,
F
It’s drawing a pic-ture
C C#aug
That Christmas is only seven weeks away.

More from The Blue Myself's One Minute Christmas Carols.

Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs: IX. Brand New Christmas

2011-12-09T04:59:00.000-08:00

Now, here's a strange chocolate for the advent calendar... What was Hot Chocolate thinking when they wrote a Christmas song with the lyric "We need a brand new Jesus"?

I agree with youtube commentor Xtronicus who wrote "THE MOST PROFOUND SONG EVER WRITTEN?"
Here's Brand New Christmas on spotify, & here's our epic spotified mix Infinite Non-Overplayed Christmas Playlist (listen on random!)

Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs: VIII. Christmas Wrapping & Christmas Rappin'

2011-12-08T10:25:00.000-08:00

Hello, this is the Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs. Today, a double feature. I heard Stephen Metcalf on the Slate Culture Gabfest recommend this Christmas song Christmas Wrapping by The Waitresses, a nice 1980s girly rap with satisfying brass arrangements. Look, someone synchronized it to their Christmas decorations:

Here's the link on Spotify.
And when I was trying to find that song, I typed in "Christmas Rappin'," thinking it was spelled that way. Of course, tho, there is a Christmas Rappin' by Kurtis Blow from 1979! "Now I'm the guy named Kurtis Blow / And Christmas is one thing I know. / So every year just about this time / I celebrate it with a rhyme." Poetry!

Here's that song on Spotify. And here's our epic several-day-long Infinite Non-Overplayed Christmas Playlist (listen on random!)

In related news, HuffPost has a post called "15 Most Annoying Christmas Songs." There are some truly bad songs there I'd never heard of, like Simple Plan's "Christmas List," which has the lyrics "Santa is coming tonight / And I want a car & I want a life."

Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs: VII. Bluegrass White Snow

2011-12-07T10:36:00.000-08:00

This song reminds me of Dolly Parton's great "The Grass Is Blue" as far as obvious twists on the genre name blue grass. "Bluegrass White Snow" from Patty Loveless' 2008 album Bluegrass & White Snow: A Mountain Christmas, is a bit bland, but the bluegrass harmonies are really beautiful, & doesn't that sound like Dolly singing back-up on the recording? Here's a live video:

Here's the song on spotify, & here's our Infinite Non-Overplayed Christmas Playlist (listen on random!)

Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs: VI. My Fiancée Ran Off With A Christmas Elf

2011-12-06T10:02:00.000-08:00

Welcome back to itwaslost.org's Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs. The last few days I've had a project of writing & posting one minute songs called The Blue Myself's One Minute Christmas Carols. This one is a parody of the one-joke novelty song genre, called "My Fiancée Ran Off With A Christmas Elf."

Here's The Blue Myself on Facebooks.
A funny story about this song. Within an hour of writing it & posting this on youtube, I was walking to work & I got a voice mail from my mother saying "I'm really worried about you, call me." I couldn't think why, & when I called she said, I don't know, recently Lauren hasn't been singing with you in your songs & you're calling yourself "Blue" & now you have a song about your girlfriend leaving you. I told her, don't worry, The Manna Tease is still together, The Blue Myself is just a side project for novelty songs, none of these songs are autobiographical. Then she said she didn't think the songs were funny: "I don't remember laughing."

Lyrics & chords:

My Fiancée Ran Off With a Christmas Elf

E D A E
My Fiancée ran off with a Christmas Elf,
C#min G# A B7
I guess you could say she stooped to the lowest shelf.
C#min G# A E
She said was going to leave, and she was gone on Christmas Eve,
D A E
My Fiancée left me alone Christmas Day.

I regret being a nerd, I regret being a slob.
Her new boyfriend might be indentured, but at least he’s got a job.
He might be small of stature, but at least he looks up to her.
I’ve no more Fiancée, Christ was born today.

My Fiancée ran off with a Christmas Elf,
I guess I’ll sit here crying, drinking eggnog by myself.
All I want for Christmas is to punch his stupid little face.
All she wanted was an iPod, but she got a tripod.

©2011 The Manna Tease

If E is a tricky key & you want to sing it in a lower Elvis-y voice, try these chords:
C Bb F C
Amin E F G7
Amin E F C
Bb F C

More The Blue Myself's One Minute Christmas Carols.

Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs:V.

2011-12-05T18:02:00.000-08:00

As everyone knows, "White Christmas" was written as a toss-off novelty vaudeville song by the Jewish Irving Berlin, and became the best-selling song in the history of music (according to Guinness, approx. 50 million copies). Fittingly oppositely, this heartfelt single by The Emotions called "Black Christmas" didn't even make the charts. But it's still soulful:

Here's the link on Spotify. & here's our Infinite Non-Overplayed Christmas Playlist (listen on random!)

Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs: IV. Christmas with Richard Nixon

2011-12-04T16:22:00.000-08:00

Listening to hundreds of Christmas songs has poisoned my creative juices, & I started writing some short ones which I'll call "The Blue Myself's One Minute Christmas Carols." The first one, written & recorded quickly yesterday, is called "Christmas with Richard Nixon". (You can hear the common cold in my voice.)

It's fitting that my highly conceptual concept band The Blue Myself should put out a Christmas album as its first endeavor.

Lyrics & chords:

Christmas with Richard Nixon

D Emin A
My wassail cup is filled with gin & vermouth,
D Emin A
‘Tis the season to be jowly & uncouth.
F# Bmin
God bless the master of this house,
G A D
Was that a break-in or a mouse?
F# Bmin A
Red phones ring, & the children sing,

D F# Bmin G
Christmas with Richard Nixon,
D F# Bmin G
Christmas with the jews & the gays, Ho ho hey,
D Bmin7
The snow would be grey if there weren’t no EPA.
Emin A
Christ bas born today,
A A7 D
But I saw Mommy kiss a commie.

©2011 The Manna Tease

Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs: III. Gower Wassail

2011-12-03T12:14:00.000-08:00

There's a couple good versions of the Welsh carol, the Gower Wassail, on spotify. I was glad that Wikipedia had this handy helpful chart for the choruses:

That's right, haters, the default font in my browsers is Comic Sans. Eat it.

Here's my favorite version of Gower Wassail, by John Langstaff and the Christmas Revels. It's satisfyingly krummhorny.

Here's a version by Kerfuffle from their excellent "Midwinter" album Lighten the Dark, more on that later.

And, this one by Steeleye Span is also pretty good & has some crunchy harmonies, & someone put it on youtube:

Now master and mistress let your company forbear
To fill up our wassail with you cider and beer
We want none of your pale beer, nor none of your small
But a drop of your kilderkin, that's next to the wall

More lyrics from Wikipedia.

Infinite Non-Overplayed Christmas Playlist (listen on random.)

Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs: II. A Counting Song

2011-12-02T12:49:00.000-08:00

On the second advent day before Christmas, I bring you "A Counting Song," also known as "Come And I Will Sing You." Move out of the way "12 Days of Christmas" with your strange Lords a-leapin'. "A Counting Song" has some more abstract counties, like eight filly-white, & "six are the six that never did mix."

I knew a version from Nowell Sing We Clear (with John Roberts & Tony Barrand) that I had on a mix years ago, but that version seems hard to locate. However, there's a great album on Spotify by Shira Kammen called The Castle of the Holly King. It contains this exciting version:

	Shira Kammen - A Counting Song .mp3

	Found at bee mp3 search engine

Come and I will sing you,
What shall I sing you?
I will sing you one alone,
What shall be the one alone?
One is one and one alone.
Come to my dilly, come dally, come dilly
Alone, and ever shall remain so.

Repeat and add two, three, etc., increasing to

Come and I will sing you,
What shall I sing you?
I will sing you twelve of them,
What shall be the twelve of them?
Twelve are the followers all in a row,
'Leven, eleven all gone to heaven,
Ten are the ten command-i-ments,
Nine of them's Aunt Mary Ann,
Eight of them are the filly-shine white,
Seven are the shiners up in the sky,
Six are the six that never did mix,
Five are the oxen standing by,
Four, the carollers at the door,
Three are the three that's in Bethlea,
Two are the Chris-si-mas babes in green,
One is one and one alone.
Come to my dilly, come dally, come dilly
Alone, and ever shall remain so.

Apologies: & Re-Spearheading a Re-Initiative of an All-New Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs

2011-12-01T23:49:00.000-08:00

Hello, & welcome back to itwaslost.org. & Apologies for the five week radio silence, so much has happened. Actually, nothing has happened, but there is also a Manna Tease tumblr blog - themannatease.tumblr.com - which exists.

Furthermore, Mr Jason Islas is spearheading an initiative called Advent Bloggifying. This reminds me that in the year of our lord Twenty-Ten, I advent blogged all 24 days leading up to Christmas with a Special Department called the Special Department of Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs. So I hearby [sic] now re-spearhead a new re-initiative of an all-new 2011 Advent Calendar of Non-Overplayed Christmas Songs.

This is an issue very important to me, & of which I spend 11 months of the year not thinking at all about, & the remaining month thinking of nothing else. My love-hate relationship with Christmas music borders on manic-depression. It is often manic, but it is proceeded by the mid-November chill of death upon hearing the first Carol of the Bells in some Nissan TV advertisement. I realize this relationship to Christmas music isn't unique, but perhaps mine is personally intense. (I propose a six week boycott of any company that uses any Christmas song in an ad before Thanksgiving.)

So to save the ubiquitous Christmas songs from themselves, I have a project of collecting the best & worst of non-overplayed Christmas songs. My personal collection is already many hours long, but this year is the year of Spotify. If you do not have Spotify right now, you are a fool, because it could be a short-lived Golden Age if record labels are going to pull all of the music from it. My spotified playlist of non-Overplayed Christmas songs, ranging from the worst to the best, is now at least 30 hours long & is still being expanded, pruned, & improved. (Please listen to it on random.)

For the Advent, I'll post a song a day until Christmas. Day 1 of my Advent Calendar I am going to go with a new recording, from Carole King's 2011 album A Holiday Carole (get it?) This album isn't amazing, in fact it's lame, but for a washed-up '70s pop star - "(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman" - it's better than one of Kenny Rogers' 47 Christmas albums. It contains a bunch of sucky new songs written by her daughter Louise Goffin - but by my calculation, the album is only 25% overplayed Christmas songs, so that's commendable. I think this song "Everyday Will Be Like A Holiday" is strangely satisfying, especially on repeated listening. It's a cover of a song by soul singer William Bell, but I like her singing & production better. Now, come back here every day for a NEW Non-Overplayed Christmas Song. & listen to the spotify mix if you wish.

in Berlin

2011-10-23T11:18:00.000-07:00

In Berlin, we couldn't resist singing the song "In Berlin," a work-in-progress from an upcoming song cycle (The Theosaur Slayer), which was inspired by my memories of Berlin, Nevada, (a ghost town that has dinosaur fossils) & the one of the reasons we went out to stay there. The melody is adapted from the folk hymn "Florence" (which mentions deserts & dragons), and the lyrics tell the story of a nameless boy who lives in the desert & discovers a monster in the abandoned mines.

Lyrics & chords:

In Berlin
D Bmin Emin7 Asus4 Bmin A D

In Berlin, a ghost town in Central Nevada, lived a boy without any name.

D Bmin Emin7 Asus4 Bmin A D

He had built a shack out of broken bottles, a recycled gold rush claim.

D D/C# Bmin Asus4 D Bmin A

And in the nights when the desert’s frigid, his grandmother’s ghost would visit,

D Bmin Emin7 Asus4 Bmin A

And they’d sup on scorpion tail cocktails, & silently hide from the spirits.

And there was a hill to the East of the ruins that his ghosty Granny had warned,

Don’t you ever go there, the pinyon pins round the mines is mysteriously burned,

But being a boy with an tween’s free will & the imaginings of a devil,

He was bored one Wednesday while out exploring, and he found himself on the hill.

Down into the mine-shaft climbed the child, no one was there to watch him,

And he lit a match in the ancient darkness, & wandered round with caution.

A humongous monster was deeply sleeping, as if for millions of years.

With the arms of a rat, & the wings of an eagle, & brobdingnagian ears.

But they weren’t alone, & poltergeist who haunted far & wide

Knocked some rocks on the supports, and a noisy collapse sealed off only the way outside.

The monster woke & it gasped for breath, a ten thousand pound canary,

And it grabbed the boy, burst through the earth, & they flew off in the fiery sky.

©2011 The Manna Tease

Please "like" The Manna Tease on facebooks here.
Here are some more photos from our trip to Berlin:

Foo Fighters - Keepin' It Clean - Lyrics & Chords - Special Friends Around the Campfire, actual campfire edition

2011-10-11T11:28:00.000-07:00

This amazing Gay-Truckers-showering song, "Keep it Clean" or "Keepin' it Clean," plays in the background of the opening of the Foo Fighter's music video to "Hot Buns" (2011). This summer, they famously rolled up on a flat bed truck in Kansas City & sang it to the Westboro Baptist Church "God hates fags" protesters, which might have been one of the best moments in American history.

The Manna Tease were camping in Berlin-Ichthyosaur State Park in the Great Basin desert last weekend, & sang it around the campfire - it's a bit shaky, we were doing it fresh from memory & after a bit of afternoon bourbon, but here goes:

And for your convenience, here are the lyrics & chords we use:

C G C C7

Keep It clean, my mama said keep It clean (2x)

F

Driving all night, got a hankering for something

C A7

Think I'm In the mood for some hot-man muffins

D7 G Gaug

Mmmm, Sounds so fine, yes indeed

Keep It Clean, my Daddy said keep it clean (2x)

Ain't looking for a fight, ain't looking for trouble

Howdy Mr Right have you met Mister Bubble

Hey, put 'er there, ain't she sweet.

F

Rubbin' and a lovin' and a scrubbin' and a truckin'

C A7

Maybe if we're lucky just a little bear huggin'

D7 G7 C F C

Know what I mean, Keep it clean

Rubbin' and a lovin' and a scrubbin' and a truckin'

Maybe if we're lucky just a little bear huggin'

Know what I mean, Keep it clean

Note: We added the augmented chord for spice, it's not mandatory.
The Foo Fighters sing it in G, which is very low, but here's approx. their chords if you wish:

G D7 G

G D7 G G7

C

G E7

A7 D7

Please "like" / follow the Manna Tease on facebooks !

Jasmine Washington - The Manna Tease

2011-09-20T14:41:00.000-07:00

Here's another new song for The Manna Tease, and a video of us practicing it on the rooftop this morning. I came up with this song driving back from Tahoe a month ago, with the obligatory references to William Blake.

Here are the lyrics & chords in C (we play it in Bb.)

Jasmine Washington

C amin G F
My mother bore me in the wilds of Maine,
amin emin amin G F C
And I am white, but oh, my soul is chartreuse.
C amin G F
My heart is healthy but my pleasure is pain.
amin emin amin G F C
My blouse is usually tight, but sometimes I let it all loose.

C amin G F C

I’m just a white girl named Jasmine Washington.

amin F

I’m a little white girl, a white girl.

emin amin G F C

These colors don’t run, girls just want to have fun.

amin F

I’m a little white girl, a white girl.

emin amin dmin

Deep ocean pearl, bright clouds unfurl.

F amin G F C

Daughter of the sun, Jasmine Washington.

My father called me his rose of York,
Fertilized in manure, but lovely as the dawn.
The pig is filthy, but I’m as clean as cured pork,
And I am pure, arise my love, the night is gone.
I’m just a white girl, &c...

My boyfriend calls me his albino possom:
He is diverse, I call him America.
I’ll shield him from the shade so he can blossom,
And bear my curse, but I am naked beneath my burka.

I’m just a white girl, &c...

©2011 The Manna Tease

Please "like" the Manna Tease on facebooks. Thank you!

9/11 Was An Inside Job: the song & a new video

2011-09-08T11:03:00.000-07:00

For the anniversary of 9/11, here's a new video of my song "9/11 was an inside job," exposing many truths:

This song was previously posted, with lyrics & chords & a rehearsal mp3 here.

The Manna Tease on facebooks here.

New Illustrated Songs from The Manna Sustains: First Vision of St Olaf, and The Wind & Snow

2011-08-27T14:04:00.000-07:00

The Manna Sustains will eventually be an illuminated songbook, but I'm putting out individual illustrated songs while I work on it. Original art by Grainne Proinseas! Here's First Vision of St Olaf:
First Vision of St Olaf, from The Manna Sustains - Illustrated Sheet Music
Feel free to download, print, & play around with as you wish. This song was posted earlier here with a rehearsal youtube video:

NEXT: First Interlude: The Wind & Snow.

The Wind & Snow, First Interlude from The Manna Sustains - Illustrated Sheet Music
And we have a new video for this song, too:

The audio for that video can be downloaded as a free mp3 here if you wish:

Thank you so much. Stay tuned for more illustrated sheet music & demo videos from The Manna Sustains. Please "like" The Manna Tease on Facebooks! & also Grainne Proineas' artist page.

Illuminated Sheet Music - What Mary Noticed from The Manna Stains illustrated digital songbook!

2011-08-17T18:43:00.000-07:00

Another addition to our burgeoning genre of illuminated digital sheet music - "What Mary Noticed" from The Manna Sustains, an Epic Murder-Ballad Song-Cycle by The Manna Tease. This will eventually be a whole illustrated songbook illuminated by Grainne Proinseas, & we'll be dropping samples of individual songs as Scribd documents over the next few weeks.

What Mary Mary Noticed, from The Manna Sustains - Illuminated Sheet Music
Please download, print, and play around with as you wish. The Manna Tease singing a somewhat rough-around-the-edges rehearsal of this song into the youtubes:

Stay tuned for more illustrated songs! & more from The Manna Sustains. Lyrics to "What Mary Noticed" originally posted here. Please "like" The Manna Tease on facebooks here, & Grainne Proinseas here.

Introducing: Illuminated Sheet Music - Young Manasseh's Stains from The Manna Stains illustrated digital songbook!

2011-08-15T10:44:00.000-07:00

And now, Grainne Proinseas & I are spearheading an initiative to spearhead the genre of illuminated songbooks. The Manna Tease's Epic Murder Ballad Song Cycle, The Manna Sustains, will be a fully illuminated songbook illustrated by Grainne Proinseas, and I'll release little excerpts of individual songs as we create them, practice the project, et cetera.
Young Manassehs Stains, from The Manna Sustains - Illuminated Sheet Music

Please download, print, and play around with as you wish. I'm deliberately keeping the score pretty vague, just the melody and chord progression, with the occasional instrumental melody. Additional verses can differ slightly in melody & syncopation, &c. Here's us singing "Young Manasseh's Stains" live:

Stay tuned for more illustrated songs! & more from The Manna Sustains. Lyrics to "Young Manasseh's Stains" originally posted here. Please "like" The Manna Tease on facebooks here, & Grainne Proinseas here.

Henry K. Lee - The Manna Tease sing it live for the real Henry K. Lee!

2011-08-13T11:21:00.000-07:00

The real Henry K. Lee with the real Manna Tease

On Thursday night, a band of east bay journalists had a party at the Warehouse, a divey cop bar in Oakland (quite thematically perfect.) They invited us, the Manna Tease, to come serenade them with our song "Henry K. Lee." The song was inspired by the bay area section of the San Francisco Chronicle, wherein almost every gruesome article about crime is written by one man, Henry K. Lee. My earlier youtube of it had become quasi-famous amongst colleagues of the real Henry K. Lee and other people who worked on crime news in the bay area. (It was featured on blogs here, here, here & here.) It was lovely to actually meet him, altho the real Henry K. Lee, a cheerful & charming man with seemingly few demons, is the opposite of the cheap-suit-wearing, chain-smoking man we had mythologized. We promised a better quality youtube (the original was just a camera phone rehearsal, &c.) & we now doubly deliver, with a fancier one & also the live one from the Warehouse:

Enough! or two too much! of that song. Lyrics & chords posted here. Henry K. Lee's facebook page here, & if you don't get the Chronicle, you can get his book Presumed Dead here.

Please "like" the Manna Tease on facebooks here.

Department of Quotes & Conversations: Why Buy 3 Bottles of Two Buck Chuck

2011-08-06T17:25:00.000-07:00

Overheard conversation at Trader Joe's in Berkeley an hour ago: One man to another, justifying have three bottles of Charles Shaw in his basket:

"You know how when you buy two bottles, after you finish one, you're like, oh, I only have one bottle left. But when you buy three, after you finish one, you're like, I have two bottles left."

Unsurprisingly, I also had three bottles of Charles Shaw in my basket (pink wine to mix with lemonade for our Midsummer Shakespeare picnic tomorrow. I'll be playing Robin Goodfellow.)

Disc Baseball / Frisbee Baseball / Basedisc - How to play a game that doesn't exist

2011-08-04T18:10:00.000-07:00

I was playing frisbee in a baseball diamond today, & trying to imagine how disc baseball might work. Something closer to disc golf, I would hope (where you can drink beer & trash talk), than to Ultimate, which is actually athletic. (So, more whiffle ball than MLB.) I assumed that this game has already been thought up by others, but my googly-research was a bit depressing. It revealed perhaps the saddest novelty sports blog possible, which owns the domain name www.discbaseball.com, screen shot below:

I imagined a game where the "pitcher" would throw a disc to the "batter," who would have to catch it and then re-throw it as far as he could into the outfield. Perhaps the baseball strike zone would be fairly larger than a baseball strike zone: If the pitcher failed to throw within the strike zone, it would be a ball, & if he threw it in the strike zone but the hitter couldn't catch it correctly, it would be a strike. Likewise, if a fielder caught the disc after the hitter re-threw it, the hitter would be out. I think the problem is, this game might be too easy for decent athletes, and only fun for beer-drinking hippies like ourselves who don't receive or throw too well. It might not leave enough time for the hitter to get to first base, & It might be harder, & better, with a smaller disc like a disc-golf disc.

A website called gaggleofgames.com has also conceived of this game, and offers other hypothetical rules. Their use of the term "probably" makes it seem that they have not tried it either:

DISC BASEBALL

Thursday, 19 April 2007

Additional Props: Spots for Bases
This game is played like baseball except for a few minor rule changes. Set up a baseball diamond by using the spots for bases and make the bases about 20 feet apart. Divide the group into two teams. Team 1 in the field, Team 2 at “bat”. There is no pitcher, and the rest of the team in the field can position themselves as needed (probably much like baseball). The first player from Team 2 throws the disc from home plate, then runs the bases. If the throw doesn’t go 20 ft. or goes foul, the batter tries again. Three fouls is an out. If the throw is caught on the fly, or the disc reaches a base before the runner gets there the batter is also out (just like baseball). As far as the fielders go, only the basemen (1st, 2nd, 3rd) can run with the disc. The other fielders have to throw it where it was picked up. Team 2 scores a run each time a runner crosses home plate. We play three outs to an inning and then the teams switch places. Make sure the fielders are at least 20 feet away (mark this area with the boundary cones) from home plate, so they don’t get beamed with the disc.

Please comment if anyone has attempted to play Disc Baseball, if it is just a bad idea, or how the rules might evolve into something functioning & fun.
Update: I also found this video, listed under "BaseDisc":

Sweet new Maloo Music Video: Sheehow

2011-08-04T10:55:00.000-07:00

And now, a spicy sweet new music video from friends-of-the-blog Maloo [sic] featuring Olaf Mary & Jordan Epcar & a lovely film by Georges Méliès. [Note: This song was originally called "Parkinglot Dots" by the White Rasberries [sic]; correction appended.]

Indian Cress - Nasturtium love song - demo recording & video

2011-08-02T12:32:00.000-07:00

Here's a tiny new love song, inspired by the nasturtium weeds that grow all over Berkeley.

And a sample demo mp3:

This and other non-Manna Tease demo songs available at the Friends Around the Campfire store here.

Please "like" / follow our band The Manna Tease on facebooks here.

Lyrics & chords:
(I'm using a capo & playing it in C#.)

Indian Cress

A Cmaj7 A Gmaj7/E

A Cmaj7
My girlfriend
D E
Growing like a weed
A Cmaj7
Some loves are planned,
D E
Others take seed.

Some flowers
Smell like the judgment,
But ours
Is tangy & pungent.

A F
Indian cress
G Gmaj7/E
Undress for success,
bmin7 E
Spicy & sweet
bmin7 E
On the side of the street,
bmin7 E
Your outfit is sexist
bmin7 E
(As) the orange rose of Texas,
c#min7 F#
Listen, my catcalls:
c#min7 F#
Let down your petals.
G Gmaj7/E A
Beautiful Indian cress.

A Cmaj7
My girlfriend
D E
Climbing a fence
A Cmaj7
Some girls depend (on you)
D E
Others pay your rents.

Some demons
Are wise or exotic,
And some poisons
Can be antibiotic.

Indian cress
Undress for success,
Spicy & sweet
On the side of the street,
bmin7 E
Your outfit is racist
bmin7 E
Take off your headdress,
bmin7 E
Clean off your faces,
bmin7 E
Your make-up is running,
c#min7 F#
Your tears are becoming
c#min7 F#
The dew in the morning,
c#min7 F#
Listen, my catcalls:
c#min7 F#
Let down your petals.
G Gmaj7/E A
Beautiful Indian cress.

©2011 The Manna Tease

First Vision of St. Olaf - The Manna Sustains song no. IV

2011-07-24T19:19:00.000-07:00

First Vision of St. Olaf, Song no. IV of The Manna Tease's Epic Murder Ballad Song Cycle, The Manna Sustains!

...wherein our hero Special Agent Francis, having hitchhiked to Saskatchewan, meets a trucker whore named Elle Mary at a highway diner. They smoke a hookah, and Francis has a vision in which St Olaf advises him to seek the fugitive Young Manasseh in Mexico. Also in the same diner, a senior citizen named Lenore mysteriously dies after complaining about the restaurant's atmosphere.

Please "like" / follow our band The Manna Tease on facebooks:.

More from The Manna Sustains.

Lyrics:

First Vision of St Olaf

At a table by the door,
In a truck stop diner ‘bout a mile outside of Moose Jaw.
Sat an elderly lady named Lenore,
Moaning to her husband that her steak was somewhat raw.
Is it cold in here? I think I feel a draught....

At the next table over,
Was Special Agent Francis drinking Oolong tea.
For two thousand kilometers,
He’d been squished between to two chimpanzees
In a truck transporting monkeys.
Every time he had to pee, the chimps only laughed.

White hair down to the floor,
He thought he saw a goddess, or the oracle at Delphi,
When he saw the trucker whore.
She bid him follow her, & her name was Elle Mary.
She led him to a back room thru a small secret door.

She asked, would you like to smoke?
She lit up a hookah filled with donut-flavored shisha.
His internal senses awoke,
And in the rings of smoke saw a vision of St Olaf.
St Olaf spoke & the galaxies evoked,
Olaf danced & laughed, & the smoke became a storm,
If you want to find Manasseh, go where the winds are warm.

You must go to Mexico.
Go where dahlias grow,
Go where there’s no snow.
Go to Mexico,
Go where the warm winds blow,
Go where Charro’s apropos.
Fly South with the Geese,
Feel the breeze from off the seas,
Neath Paradise trees.
Siesta dogs with fiesta fleas,
Catch the dysentery disease,
Do whatever you damn well please,
Ay yi yi yi!

Francis emerged on the highway.
Exhaled from his mouth & stuck out his thumb due South.
Meanwhile, by the diner’s buffet,
Lenore fell over dead, her head in the basket of bread,
Lenore! her husband said, have you croaked or have you choked?
We need to call the law, oh, she said the steak seemed raw.
(But you & I both know, that the steak was perfectly well cooked.)

©2011 The Manna Tease

The Manna Sustains
An Epic Murder-Ballad Song-Cycle
by the Manna Tease

And the Lord said, I brought you into this world, and I can take you out. -Exodus 16.37

Prelude. The Wind & the Rain
Song no. I. Young Manasseh's Stains
Song no. II. On the Trail of Young Manasseh
Song no. III. What Mary Noticed
Song no. IV. First Vision of St Olaf
First Interlude. The Wind & Snow
Song no. V. Wha' Happened in Oaxaca
Song no. VIa. Who are you, Elle Mary?
Song no. VIb. Second Vision of St Olaf
Song no. VII. Pink Mary's Stains
Song no. VIIIa. Banks of Pontchartrain
Song no. VIIIb. Young Manasseh Complains
Second Interlude. The Wind & Mud
Song no. IXa. Arkansas City
Song no. IXb. On the Trail of Pink Mary
Song no. X. Pink Mary's Marriage
Song no. XIa. Chase Scene / The Spatula / Pink Mary's Death
Song no. XIb. The Manna Sustains
Song no. XIc. Pink Mary's Resurrection / Wha' Happened in Oklahoma / Who Are You, Elle Mary? (Reprise)
Song no. XII. Young Manasseh Remains
Hymn. Sacred Throne
Palinode. And I Will No Longer Smoke My Hubbly-Bubbly Solitarily

Department of Rats: Blake le Rat's first Facebook cause page

2011-07-23T13:32:00.000-07:00

I couldn't figure out how to make a "pet page" on facebooks for our pet rats, Blake le Rat & Doggy Rat. (I've heard of many people creating facebook pages for their dogs, &c., but there's no easy way to do it. Even Mark Zuckerberg's dog, Beast, has his own page, but he's listed as a "public figure." Why don't they just make "dog" or "pet" or "animal" or "rat" as options?)
Anyway, so instead, I created a "cause" page for Blake le Rat's issue of her lifetime: getting on floor. If you support this cause, I encourage you to "like" her page. The argument of this movement is summed up in the opening lines of the song The Manna Tease wrote for her, "It's a Snoopy Snoopy Poop Doggy Ratty Rat World":

She wants to get on floor, but she's not allowed on floor.
She wants to go explore, but floor could lead to door.
Blake le Rat, you're curious as a dolphin.
You're just a rat, but the world is in your tiny hand.

Pure poetry, and now she has a cause: FLOOR.

I destroyed the New York Times computer at Rock Paper Scissors

2011-07-22T14:51:00.001-07:00

Look, I pulverized the New York Times Roshambo-playing computer. (It was their "novice" computer, that learns as it goes, but still. They also have an advanced one.) I challenge anyone to beat my score in 50 games.
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/science/rock-paper-scissors.html#

Firewhiskey Recipe 2011 - How to make Firewhiskey

2011-07-21T17:23:00.000-07:00

Because the top search term leading people to this site the past month was "firewhiskey recipe," I will gladly reprint an update in a simpler, less wordy fashion, than the recipe from my essay about alcohol in the Harry Potter books:

-Slowly warm up half bottle of scotch on low heat, DO NOT BOIL!
-In a separate small pot, add various spices to about a cup of water (which can be heated to a near boil.) I recommend ample amounts of various hot chili sauces, cayenne pepper, chipotle, turmeric, nutmeg, and anything else in your spice cabinet that may have a kick.
-Mix the pots and poor into shot glasses. (Make sure it's not so hot to burn your mouth when you take the shots!)
-Chase with butterbeer.

In my original version, I used Dave's Insanity Sauce, which is a hot sauce so hot that it needs to be diluted. Since you may not be using this, there might not be any reason to dilute the spices in the cup of water, and if you wish, just add them directly to the whiskey. I'd appreciate feedback in comments!

Note on the spelling: In my original post on firewhiskey & butterbeer recipes, I spelled it "firewhisky." However, most everywhere else on the internet spells it firewhiskey, so I assume they're correct. (Generally, "whisky" is the Irish spelling, and "whiskey" everywhere else.) I don't have the books in front of me to look up how Rowling spells it, but I just noticed, in the Harry Potter Wiki, both spellings are used there for different brands: "Popular brands include Ogden's Old Firewhiskey and Blishen's Firewhisky."
_________________________________________________________________

Please "like" our band The Manna Tease on facebooks:

¡Art! ¡Cuidado! Liam Golden & Grace Marlier Art Pages

2011-07-19T10:17:00.000-07:00

Ennui, ecstasy, immortality, & antipathy... that's right, gentlemen, art is on display on the internet.

First, Liam Golden Does Things, the blog on his website liamgolden.com, has been rapidly putting up art in the last twenty-four hours. These are websites you should occasionally peruse. Here's one of the posts, called "Bird! Stone! Water!"

Working on an illustration
for an article on Rock! Paper! Scissors!

or as I know it from childhood, Ro! Sham! Bo!

(or Rochambeau, not to be confused with the French vicomte and soldier who shares my two christian names (Joseph, Mary)).

Also known as Bird! Stone! Water! and Wrap! Cut! Crush!

Interesting that Olaf Mary shares my newfound love for Comic Sans, great minds thinking alikely.

Next I invite you to "like" Grainne Proinseas' new facebook artist page, Grace Marlier. It has FASHION! SKETCHES! DRAWINGS! PAINTINGS! ART!

That one, from the album G.F. Marlier; some fashion illustrations, is captioned "want to make this for [Minnie Molly Mary]," of The Manna Tease. Exciting. And, finally here's a sketch of Mr Quill & me in Bulgaria, from the album Beautiful To Forget, More Beautiful Still To Be Forgotten, a collection of drawings from our Eastern European vacation:

What Mary Noticed - The Manna Sustains song no. III

2011-07-16T13:59:00.000-07:00

Our Epic Murder Ballad Song Cycle, The Manna Sustains, continues with song no. III, "What Mary Noticed." Here's us singing it on youtube:

What Mary Noticed, Song no. III of The Manna Tease's Epic Murder Ballad Song Cycle, The Manna Sustains!

...wherein Pink Mary, a 12-year-old girl who lives in the sewers, observes secretly the goings on in Arkansas City, including the machinations of Miss Masha, the mayor's mistress. Mary sees her purchasing Rohypnol from a contrabassoon-playing dwarf and surreptitiousness poisoning Young Manasseh & the Deputy Sheriff, Maple Seraph, who are having a lusty romance. That same chilly evening, the mayor mysteriously kicks the bucket, & Miss Masha succeeds him.

Please "like" / follow our band The Manna Tease on facebooks!

The first two songs, Young Manasseh's Stains & On the trail of Young Manasseh, were posted on this blog here. More of The Manna Sustains on itwaslost.

Lyrics:

What Mary Noticed

As black as a galactic eclipse,
And as reactionary as a reactionist,
Is Pink Mary’s filthy face.
She thinks that it’s pretty neat
To live beneath the city street.
And she sees things from her secret space.

She noticed the Mayor of Arkansas City
Leave the City Hall at about 11:30,
With a woman who was not his wife.
The girl tripped over a napping vagrant,
Who was wafting nasty odors flatulently fragrant,
And out of her satchel fell a small switchblade knife.

The police would love to see what
Mary sees, but unfortunately,
She lives beneath their toes.
She wears a fleece to shield her
From the breeze, she fears that she will freeze.
As the sewer urchins know:
She’s already lost her nose.

The next afternoon outside an underground saloon,
Mary noticed a dwarf with a contrabassoon
Selling flunitrazepam to the Mayor’s mistress.
Then she saw the vagrant & a female officer,
Stumbling arm-in-arm down a dark corridor,
As he fumbled with the straps on her dress.

Mary saw the Mayor’s mistress see the strange pair,
And she watched them in the alley strip into their underwear.
And she slyly slipped on a skier’s mask.
The mistress crept up to the fornicating couple,
As invisible as a heaping rubble of trouble.
And she slipped the rufies into the vagrant’s flask.

The police would love to see what, &c...

That night it was pretty windy,
There was a cold draught slamming shutters all over the city,
And Pink Mary bundled up in her fleece.
In the morning, outside the Mayor’s mansion,
Cops & ambulances clustered neath the Kansas sun.
The Mayor was stone dead… with no sign of disease.

The dwarf took out his contrabassoon,
And played a sorrowful tune to the midwinter moon,
And Mary wept.
She noticed the vagrant & his lover flee town,
And the mistress put on her head the Mayor’s crown,
And Mary snatched the switchblade… from off of the City Hall steps.

The contra-bassoon played: baaah bah bah bah, &c...

©2011 The Manna Tease
"What Mary Noticed" incorporates the traditional folk tune "Sacred Throne," by Hugh Wilson (1800), (public domain.)

UPDATE: How about an illustrated songbook version of this song?

What Mary Mary Noticed, from The Manna Sustains - Illuminated Sheet Music

The Manna Sustains
An Epic Murder-Ballad Song-Cycle
by the Manna Tease

And the Lord said, I brought you into this world, and I can take you out. -Exodus 16.37

Prelude. The Wind & the Rain
Song no. I. Young Manasseh's Stains
Song no. II. On the Trail of Young Manasseh
Song no. III. What Mary Noticed
Song no. IV. First Vision of St Olaf
First Interlude. The Wind & Snow
Song no. V. Wha' Happened in Oaxaca
Song no. VIa. Who are you, Elle Mary?
Song no. VIb. Second Vision of St Olaf
Song no. VII. Pink Mary's Stains
Song no. VIIIa. Banks of Pontchartrain
Song no. VIIIb. Young Manasseh Complains
Second Interlude. The Wind & Mud
Song no. IXa. Arkansas City
Song no. IXb. On the Trail of Pink Mary
Song no. X. Pink Mary's Marriage
Song no. XIa. Chase Scene / The Spatula / Pink Mary's Death
Song no. XIb. The Manna Sustains
Song no. XIc. Pink Mary's Resurrection / Wha' Happened in Oklahoma / Who Are You, Elle Mary? (Reprise)
Song no. XII. Young Manasseh Remains
Hymn. Sacred Throne
Palinode. And I Will No Longer Smoke My Hubbly-Bubbly Solitarily

Butterbeer Recipe 2011

2011-07-13T16:39:00.000-07:00

Two years ago I published a short essay on the alcoholic magical beverages in the Harry Potter books, with my versions on how to make them, called "Firewhisky Recipe! Butterbeer Recipe!" It's since been one of the most viewed posts on this blog, and for good reason. They are delicious.

In anticipation of the final movie coming out this week, one of the top articles on The Huffington Post was "Butterbeer: How the Harry Potter Beverage Was Made Real." According to Jim Hill: "Based on surveys that UOR employees have done, the greatest Guest Satisfier in the Wizarding World of Harry Potter [the theme park in Florida], that piece-of-the-magic that people most wish that they could take home and share with friends and family... is a beverage. Butterbeer, to be precise."

He also said the Wizarding World folks "labored for nearly three years to come up with a workable real-world recipe for this magical, mythical brew." Three years, really? Our recipe came to my friend Jenny Ruth in a dream. The sugary, highly-processed creation they serve at the theme park, of course, has a top-secret recipe. So you have to apparate to Florida to drink butterbeer? Do you know what else has a secret recipe? Coca-cola. And Ira Glass, like Hermione would have done, figured that one out with a little research.

"So -- that said -- what is actually known about this amber ale?," you query. Well, there are two distinct phases to the preparation / pouring of a glass of Butterbeer. First the bottom layer -- a slightly thickened mixture which tastes like a combination of butterscotch, cream soda and shortbread cookies -- is poured into the bottom of the glass. Then the Butterbeer's head -- which is this lighter, fluffier, less sweet version of marshmallow fluff -- is carefully placed on top of the brown brew that has previously been poured into this glass.

I fully sympathize with a Harry Potter-themed resort wanting to sell a version of the magical drinks, one that can be legally sold to kids and help them have an inspiring experience. (The "magic" in that secret recipe sounds like it's sugar and artificial flavoring, which would have the magical effects of a sugar-high and weight gain.) A close reading of Rowling's books will reveal that Butterbeer is not only magical but alcoholic. It's clearly the latter, because it has certain mild but well-known effects on the student characters after they consume it, such as the lowering of inhibitions. As I wrote in my essay two years ago:

In Harry Potter, after Harry has been attacked by a dementor, Professor Lupin gives him chocolate to restore him, not exactly advanced magic. All thru-out the books, Rowling understands that there are simpler magics & emotional forces more powerful than some of her sillier spells. What exactly is a potion but a brewed beverage with transformative properties? Alternately, when Ron is recovering from a strong potion, Professor Slughorn gives him a shot of mead which turns out to be laced with a powerful poison - not exactly the positive metaphor for drinking that parents fear. And there's of course two much more potent beverages in the Half-Blood Prince book - love potion & felix felicis (liquid luck). None of this fictional magic is far-fetched from what any teenager or adult has experienced from well-timed libations.

At the time, I was righteously outraged by online recipes I found, not because they were non-alcoholic but because they were disgusting, using melted butter & butterscotch syrup. I'll reprint now the simple alcoholic itwaslost version, which I recommend smuggling into the cinema this weekend:

-a dark ale or black ale (I recommend New Belgium's 1554 black ale.)
-a dash of butterscotch schnapps on top.

It's easy & inexpensive to make, available outside of Florida, it's sweet & butterscotchy but not sugary, and it might loosen you up and give you the courage to ask the witch you like to the ball. Cheers!

The Manna Tease Live at Adobe Books, 8 July 2011

2011-07-10T11:36:00.001-07:00

Good morning. The Manna Tease played a small gig at a book store in San Francisco on Friday, and there are a few good videos of some of our new songs. What the HECK, I'm going to put them all up here, if you want to see the show.

We opened with the premiere of "Come to the Berkeley Bunghole," which is about our dream of opening a workingman's wine bar.

Lyrics & chords:

Come to the Berkeley Bunghole

emin

G bmin7 emin
It’s five o’clock in England.
C G G/B Cmaj7 amin9
Jupiter’s closed, but the Bunghole is wide open.
G bmin7 emin D Cmaj7 amin9 emin
There’s a place where the Reagan Administration never happened,
G bmin7 emin D Cmaj7 amin9
And Mama Bethany is always glad to see you again.

emin C G D
Come to the Berkeley Bunghole!
emin C G D
The workingman’s wine bar, the pauper’s pub,
emin C G G/F# emin
Your wallet’s empty, but your glass is full,
Cmaj7 amin9 bmin7 emin
Let’s tap this barrel! Let’s boogie in the club!

The graveyard shift is ended.
It’s Sunday Morning & BART hasn’t started,
There’s a place where the sadness of the street has been suspended,
And Mama Bethany is big bosom’d & big hearted.

Morning breaks in Tilden Park:
The idle rich are hiking with their labradoodles.
But in this place, the music’s loud and neon lights burn dark.
And Mama Bethany makes a mean cup of Ramen noodles.

Allons-y a la Bonde Berkeley!
Le café ouvriere, le pub indigents.
L'escarcelle est vide, mais la coupe est pleine.
On tape ce baril! nous boogie dans le club!
©The Manna Tease 2011

We did two songs from our Epic Murder Ballad Song Cycle, The Manna Sustains: Young Manasseh's Stains & Pink Mary's Stains.

This performance of "It's a Snoopy Snoopy Poop Doggy Ratty Rat World" turned out pretty good:

I did my song "Isa Bowman," the video's here if you care to see it, although the performance was a bit flawed. And finally, here's our much-awaited premiere of tomorrow's chart-topping single "Whoops! my bosoms come flying out!"

Lyrics & chords:

whoops! my bosoms come flying out!

dmin

emin C bmin A dmin
Wonderful suburbs, the roads to the safeway of this world.
emin C bmin A dmin
Stuffed in my tube top, my goldilocks shampooed, long and curled.
A G (emin)
As I fill my cart with seasonal fruits,
A emin G A
My top explodes all over the cantaloops, and

dmin C F A
Whoops! my bosoms come flying out!
dmin
Whoops! my bosoms! Whoops! my bosoms!
dmin C F A
Whoops! my bosoms come flying out!

Powerful pantsuit, the honorable senator from Nebrasker,
Storming the forum, never lack-lustre if her luck’ll last her.
I will muster all my brimstone & bluster,
Ask her how to bust this blasted filibuster, and

Whoops! my bosoms come flying out! &c...

Blast off & cast off into our culture’s future frontier,
Across the universe, headfirst in a shuttle shooting somewhere.
I am absolutely safe in my spacesuits,
But a blackhole ripple ripens my sexy spacefruits, and

Whoops! my bosoms come flying out! &c...

G A G A
Bosoms all over the place! - - - Bosoms all over deep space! ©The Manna Tease 2011

Thanks to The Matinees for arranging that "variety show" + poetry reading. Please "like" The Manna Tease on Facebook.

Annals of Failed Cocktailology: The Chilled Chocolate Mimosa

2011-07-07T12:31:00.000-07:00

I had pretty vivid dreams last night, and I remember clearly inventing a cocktail called the chilled chocolate mimosa. It was a catering dream, where I was proudly showing my boss a drink I had created by adding chocolate syrup to champagne, & he was planning on adding it to an event's menu. We experimented by using high-quality chocolate and cream, & it was delicious. This morning, M.M.M. made homemade eggs benedict & Hollandaise sauce, and I set out to recreate the mixology of my dreams.

It was a colossal failure, & I do not recommend attempting it. The chocolate syrup would not dissolve in the champagne, & it tasted weird. When we dissolved good quality cocoa in cream and then added it to champagne, the milk curdled. It looked and tasted horrible. We have switched back to limeade mimosas for the day. If anyone has any solutions, let us know.

W.O.S. - "What's Op, Sammy?" - Sam Amidon's Tumblr

2011-07-03T10:00:00.000-07:00

If you're not following Sam Amidon's new tumblr blog, I recommend it. It's good to see him bloggifying again. Mr Amidon is a folksinger, movie star, and mid-level Virgin Airlines executive. (He & I were in the legendary Liberal Arts college band Radiohead a decade ago - not to be confused with the British band - so if you ever see posters around Westchester County maintaining "RADIOHEAD WILL REUNITE!" that's the reason.)

This was a good series from W.O.S. (which I believe stands for "What's Op, Sammy?") He responded to several e-mails he received intended for other S. Amidons:

The Ballad of Henry K. Lee featured on KQED news blog

2011-06-30T10:57:00.000-07:00

Jon Brooks posted our Henry K. Lee song on the KQED news blog this morning, and added further mythologizing to the legendary Lee:

A Musical Homage to the Chronicle Crime Reporter: The Ballad of Henry K. Lee

June 30, 2011, 10:29 am • Posted by Jon Brooks

I don't think you have to do exactly what I do every morning to fully appreciate the video below, but it would probably help.
See, it's my 6:30 a.m. pleasure each day to sift through a hundred or so articles from Bay Area media, culling the most important news for inclusion in our Morning Splash feature. Among the municipal affairs of state -- the budgets, court decisions, and political goings-on -- inevitably, included in the pool of potentially newsworthy items, is the crime reporting of the Chronicle's Henry K. Lee.
Man found shot to death in downtown Santa Rosa - Henry K. Lee, Chronicle Staff Writer (Jun 30)
Fairfield, CA, market owner killed in robbery - Henry K. Lee, Chronicle Staff Writer (Jun 29)
Mom, daughter guilty of murdering Dublin woman, 91 - Henry K. Lee, Chronicle Staff Writer (Jun 28)
During those groggy 6:30 a.m. sessions, it's been my indulgence to picture Mr. Lee as a Weegee-like figure, working late into the night to chronicle the region's noiresque underbelly. Haunted, perhaps, by the things he's seen, the places he's been, the dark corners of minds touched by just enough madness to murder. Yet driven by duty, professionalism -- hey, it's a job -- he carries on, carries on, cigarettes and flask at the ready for the rare moments it all becomes just a little too much...
And then I'm moving on to read about the Twitter tax break or the redevelopment fight...
Silly, I know. But someone else has also engaged in projections about the man-of-a-thousand-crime-scenes, the Berkeley-based rock duo The Manna Tease. Pretty awesome song, I think:

Lyrics and more about the song here.

And he linked to The Manna Tease facebook page and to this blog! most excellent. Thank you Mr Brooks. The "real" Henry K. Lee posted it on his facebook page and added "Thanks to KQED's Jon Brooks for this post -- and his comparison to me as a 'Weegee-like' figure! (I had to look that up on Wikipedia!)."

There were also some positive reactions from other Bay Area journalists on Twitter:

@JulieStrack: Which former @dailycal writer has contributed more to popular music -- Jann Wenner or @henryklee ?http://t.co/UCQti7T

@matthai: @MannaTease We loved it. Your song was just hilarious. Those of us who work with @henryklee have been singing the lyrics to him.

@katieworth: Amazing ballad about Chron reporter @henryklee: http://t.co/5vUmbUG. Hey @hankschulman, how come you don't have one?

@SovernNation: @Josh_Richman @HenryKLee I want one about Melrose! A guy on the street sang me a song he wrote about me once called "The Lonely Newsman"

@Josh_Richman: My career will not be complete until someone writes a song about me, as this man has done for @HenryKLee http://t.co/HZM35QH via @youtube

@jpanzar: A truly amazing ballad: "If it's crime and it's grimy, it's written by @henryklee."http://t.co/E36YeQ8 ... via @WgKANE

Most of those twitterers were reporters who work for the SF Chronicle, SF Examiner, Daily Cal, and others. The biggest fans of that song seem to be journalists who actually know the man himself. I wonder if I can cull some promotional quotes from those. All I've got so far is "croons... for seemingly no reason at all." -SF Weekly.

Here's the demon mp3 of the song, available for a dollar if you desire:

Young Manasseh's Stains & On the Trail of Young Manasseh - The Manna Sustains

2011-06-30T09:12:00.000-07:00

And now! We are excited to announce that we are beginning to put songs from our new EPIC MURDER BALLAD SONG CYCLE, The Manna Sustains, on youtubes. It is narrative collection of folk songs, with many characters weaving thru the story, a bit of mystery and INTRIGUE, plenty of sex, drinking and drugs. We would like to perform the whole thing some time this summer, but in the meantime, for lack of anything better to do with this project, here are videos of The Manna Tease singing the first two songs: "Young Manasseh's Stains" and "On the Trail of Young Manasseh."
Update: I think the live version from our Adobe books gig is better than the one originally posted (below):

Young Manasseh's Stains

...wherein Young Manasseh comes to Arkansas City to find romance, goes on a Bender, and elopes with the Sheriff's Deputy.

Young Manasseh came to Arkansas City for to find romance.
The lights were bright & the girls were pretty, but Manny was too drunk to dance.
He laid on the steps of City Hall to take a nap.
He dreamt of alligators & an apple as round as the equator,
And his feet went tappity-tap-tap-tappity-tap.
Then descendin' the steps of City Hall came a deputy sheriff named Maple Seraph,
And said, Manny, you smell like poop.

Young Manasseh woke up in the drunk tank hungover as Colonel Qaddafi.
Sheriff Maple said you have only yourself to thank. Would you like a cup of coffee?
Manny & Maple went to get some cappuccino next door at the casino owned by Donald Trump.
They talked about the economy & the rising of the sea,
And his heart went thumputy thump-thump-thumpity thump-thump-thumpity-thump.
They switched to margaritas & shots of tequilas & bet on the Kenos,
And they put all their money on red.

Young Manesseh woke up in a nasty motel where Elvis once stayed.
Next to Manny was the Sheriff Maple & her rifle on the bed where they laid.
She said, Manny, oh, Man, we need to make a plan, 'cause I think we killed a man, but first where's my clothes?
Then he kissed her on the nose & on her roast beef toes,
And she moaned out whoa-whoa who's-your-do-see-dodo-doze whoa-whoa-whoa-whoze.
They hopped in his '90's Toyota & drove to the border of Louisiana,
Where they ditched the rifle.

Young Manasseh ran out of gas in the Mississippi swamp.
He & Sheriff Maple set up a muddy igloo & made love in the muddy damp.
He said, you don't have to decide, but if you'd like to be my bride, I've got nothing to provide, & she said Ja!
So they killed an alligator & they baked an apple fritter, & danced till later,
And they sang la la la la la la la la la la la.
The moral of the tale's if you want to kill a whale, you don't always need a harpoon,
But it helps get the Sheriff drunk.

©2011 The Manna Tease

Here's a free downloadable mp3 of the above live version if you wish to have it:

UPDATE: Introducing new illuminated sheet music! "Young Manasseh's Stains" with illustrations by Grainne Proinseas:
Young Manassehs Stains, from The Manna Sustains - Illuminated Sheet Music

On the Trail of Young Manasseh

...wherein we find our hero, Special Agent Francis, searching for the fugitive Young Manasseh up in Alaska.

Special Agent Francis on the trail of Young Manasseh,
Hitched a lift with a hang-glider from Ketchikan, Alaska:
Her name's Amanda, from Ketchikan, Alaska!

Special Agent Francis on the trail of Young Manasseh,
Hitched a lift with a hang-glider from Ketchikan, Alaska:
Her name's Amanda, from Ketchikan, Alaska!

As they soared above the glacier,
Fantastic as fallacier,
On the trail of Young Manasseh,
Swarms of clouds unfold to form a boreal castle,
Swarms of clouds unfold to form a boreal....

Amanda sang,
Where does the ice go when it melts into my glass of Scotch?
Francis said,
Should you be drinking while you're hang-gliding, miss?
Amanda sang,
When we die in the Arctic, do the glaciers weep & watch?
Francis replied,
Please pay attention where you're guiding us.

Special Agent Francis, airsick, & sick of her song,
Ditched his hippie hang-glider & hitchhiked to Saskatchewan,
Goodbye Amanda! see you never!

Special Agent Francis on the trail of Young Manasseh,
Hitched a lift with a hang-glider from Ketchikan, Alaska:
Her name's Amanda, from Ketchikan, Alaska!

Special Agent Francis, airsick, & sick of her song,
Ditched his hippie hang-glider & hitchhiked to Saskatchewan,
Goodbye Amanda! see you never!

©2011 The Manna Tease
"On the Trail of Young Manasseh" incorporates the traditional American folk tune "Boll Weevil" (public domain.)

Next: Song no. III: What Mary Noticed.

The Manna Sustains
An Epic Murder-Ballad Song-Cycle
by the Manna Tease

And the Lord said, I brought you into this world, and I can take you out.
-Exodus 16.37

Prelude. The Wind & the Rain
Song no. I. Young Manasseh's Stains
Song no. II. On the Trail of Young Manasseh
Song no. III. What Mary Noticed
Song no. IV. First Vision of St Olaf
First Interlude. The Wind & Snow
Song no. V. Wha' Happened in Oaxaca
Song no. VIa. Who are you, Elle Mary?
Song no. VIb. Second Vision of St Olaf
Song no. VII. Pink Mary's Stains
Song no. VIIIa. Banks of Pontchartrain
Song no. VIIIb. Young Manasseh Complains
Second Interlude. The Wind & Mud
Song no. IXa. Arkansas City
Song no. IXb. On the Trail of Pink Mary
Song no. X. Pink Mary's Marriage
Song no. XIa. Chase Scene / The Spatula / Pink Mary's Death
Song no. XIb. The Manna Sustains
Song no. XIc. Pink Mary's Resurrection / Wha' Happened in Oklahoma / Who Are You, Elle Mary? (Reprise)
Song no. XII. Young Manasseh Remains
Hymn. Sacred Throne
Palinode. And I Will No Longer Smoke My Hubbly-Bubbly Solitarily

Please follow / "like" our band The Manna Tease on facebooks!

Quotes: Louis C.K. Analyzes Why Fart Humor is Funny

2011-06-29T13:52:00.000-07:00

We apologize, once again, for a reduced quantity of blogging over the past few months, and general decrease since the golden years of itwaslost. (It's been a bit busy over here, & other contributors have many other exciting projects going on.) However, to ease back into more regular serious bloggifying, I wanted to start with Louis C.K.'s amazing analysis about fart humor from last night's Daily Show with Jon Stewart: "Let's break down a fart for a second," he said, and then listed on his finger:

1. It comes out of your ass.
2. It smells like poop because it's been hanging out next to it for a long time.
3. And it makes a little trumpet noise when it comes out.

He then summed up, "You don't have to be smart to laugh at farts, but you have to be stupid not to." Stewart made some comment that most explanations of jokes strip the joke of its comedy, but this one only enhanced and deepened the understanding of the phenomenon. I propose that this should be published as an appendix to Sigmund Freud's "Jokes and their Relation to the Unconscious" (Der Witz und seine Beziehung zum Unbewußten, 1905), which I've been told contains many unfunny jokes.

The real Henry K. Lee responds to the song: "The white guy in the video is not me!"

2011-06-28T16:39:00.000-07:00

The SF Weekly blog The Snitch posted the video of my new song "Henry K. Lee," and got a quote from Mr Lee himself. The whole post, written by Erin Sherbert, is worth repeating here:

WTF?
Too Much Free Time: Guy Writes a Song for Chron Reporter Henry K. Lee on YouTube

We know Henry K. Lee best as the veteran Chronicle reporter who has been chasing crime stories across the Bay Area since 1994. And while we'd expect him to have a strong following at this point in his career, it seems a complete stranger has taken an unusual liking (or disliking) to Lee's dark and bleak prose about the "grit and grime" of San Francisco streets.

In a roughly-five-minute song on YouTube, this fan croons a ballad detailing stories written by the local news reporter for seemingly no reason at all.

"The white guy in the video is not me! In fact, I don't know who he is, never met the guy, and I didn't commission the song," Lee told SF Weekly. "That being said, I'm strangely honored and shocked at the same time that my work would go recognized in such an unusual -- if not macabre -- way."

We'll tell you the chorus, but do check out the full song: "Henry K. Lee, Henry K. Lee ... if it's crime and it's grimy, it's covered by Henry K. Lee."

Thank you so much for the endorsement. And thank you Mr Lee for feeling honored and shocked by the "macabre" song inspired by your writings. I do not dislike your "bleak" prose!

However.... I have a small complaint about some of Sherbert's "WTF?" prose. "...for seemingly no reason at all..."? I feel like Phillipe Petit and his dumbfounded reaction when reporters asked him "why did you do this?" after he illegally tight-roped between the Twin Towers in 1974. It's strange that you've filed my song under "Too Much Free Time." As if my job as an economist / neurosurgeon did not consume all of my hours, and I had to resort to art.

KALW had a nicer plug on their blog The Informant:

It’s not every day that a crime reporter is memorialized in song.
Henry K. Lee, the San Francisco Chronicle‘s long-time East Bay Crime reporter, was bestowed with that honor two days ago, when The Manna Tease, a Berkeley-based folk rock duo, posted their five-minute song, “The Ballad of Henry K. Lee,” to Youtube.
In short, this song goes a long way to make up for those reams of police blotter copy that have undoubtedly stolen hours of sleep away from Henry. Enjoy!

Anyway, I want to emphasize that the song was a rough draft, and I'll sing a different version with The Manna Tease when we perform in July. In the meantime, I just recorded a sample demo of that solo version (including the rape verse), and it can be bought & downloaded for one thin dollar here, if you'd like to own a copy &/or support my free-time-wasting pursuits.

Song: Henry K. Lee

2011-06-27T09:27:00.001-07:00

Hot off the presses: the Ballad of Henry K. Lee, The San Francisco Chronicle's staff crime reporter. This song is sort of in the style of early Dylan-esque straight-from-the-news folk ballads, inspired by the Bay Area section of the newspaper. Every time I open it, I notice there's like five articles about depressing crime (usually in the East Bay), "2 Teens Shot in Hayward," "2 More Beheaded in Piedmont," et cetera. And those articles are always written by one man: Henry K. Lee. (Look, the top article today written by him is called "Putting baby in oven an inexplicable horror." You can't make this up.) So he began to achieve almost mythological status in my imagination: I picture him chain-smoking cigars in a grey office somewhere downtown Oakland, reporting the grisliest crime is a day job for him. This song was written for the Manna Tease to sing (please "like" us on Facebooks!) However, we deemed some of the verses too heavy for our shows, so I recorded this more intense version now for the youtubes, and when we redo it with Minnie Molly Mary, we'll replace the "raped her at school" verse with the lighter additional verses below.

Henry K. Lee

amin G F emin
Henry Harrison, (unrelated to the president),
amin G F emin
Arrested in Oakland, driving while intoxicated.
amin G F emin
In prison he acted up, flooded his toilet,
amin G F emin
And Harrison was restrained by an over-zealous deputy.
dmim amin
They tased him to death!
dmin amin
They tased him to death!
dmin emin
And the article in the Chronicle
F G C

Was written by Henry K Lee.

amin G F emin

Henry K. Lee, Henry K. Lee,

dmin amin dmin amin
The newspaper’s gritty as this naughty city.
dmin emin
If it’s crime & it’s grimy,
F G C
It’s covered by Henry K. Lee.

April in Alameda, at the animal prison,
A canine jailbreak, Max the Pit Bull’s gone missin’!
They hunted the hound to a motel in Reno,
And his owner Melissa Perry, booked for stolen property.
And they put him to sleep!
They put Max to sleep!
And the article in the Chronicle was written by Henry K. Lee.
Henry K. Lee, &c...

A grade school in Vallejo has secrets in its classrooms.
56-year-old Jerry Johnson taught Special Educations,
His young teenage aide had a developmental disability,
Incapable of consenting, with a child’s mental capacity.

He raped her at school!

And the article in the Chronicle was written by Henry K. Lee.

Henry K. Lee, &c...

Over-caffeinated at a coffee shop, I pick up the news,
The Bay Area section has its own special blues,
If I had a dime for each sad crime told daily
By Henry K. Lee, I’d buy me a ukulele.
How do you sleep, Henry?
What are your dreams, Henry?
I worry for you, Henry, & pray you’ll never write about me.

Additional verses:

Kathleen Millikin visited a holistic clinic:
There Edward Feng sold her, quote, “Six God Tablets.”
She suffered an earache and blisters and lesions:
These “Spirit Pills” had arsenic derived from toad poisons.
The doc was a quack,
The doc was a quack.
And the article in the Chronicle was written by Henry K. Lee.

UPDATE: Here's an mp3 of it, available for a dollar if you desire:

3 quick ink sketches from photos in a book about Romania

2011-06-18T23:34:00.001-07:00

Delicious Deserts (for A.Ball)

2011-06-10T00:00:00.001-07:00

Delicious Deserts