happy tunesday! bleed me a river (the marc whinston project)

 

Continuing with the tracks from my album, Track number four is "Bleed Me a River."

For reference, previous entries in this series were:

• about the album as a whole;
• about track 1;
• about track 2;
• about track 3;

I don't actually remember where the idea came from. But I do remember walking around the Tucson Botanical Garden with an early version of this in my head. I was trying to write a Western song, thinking about such fare as "Run the Ridges," (by John Stewart) I wanted to wrote a song that told a story about the old West. I don't really remember a lot of those original lyrics. Which is probably just as well.

That was more than ten years ago.

Particularly helpful was the realization that a story song doesn't have to tell the whole story. It can allude to elements without spelling them out. And I think that this strikes a reasonable balance between elements that are spelled out explicitly and those that aren't.

As of a year ago, I was still struggling with some of the lyrics to this, but Keith and Christina Crocker brainstormed with me and helped me get the rest filled in.

I originally wrote this in a major key, but when I approached Toby he suggested that a minor key would work better. He was right.

Tom Patterson's vocals were, I think, perfect for this. I asked Toby if he could find someone who sounded like Kris Kristofferson or Johnny Cash. This was more like Country Dick Montana, which is even better.

Enjoy.

"Bleed Me a River"
Song by: Marc Whinston, Christina Zuber Crocker, and Keith J. Crocker
Lead vocal by Tim Patterson
All instruments and backing vocals by Toby Wilson
Arranged and Produced by Toby Wilson for Tobias Wilson Music, Ltd.

cinema history class: earth vs. the spider (1958)

The session: "A tribute to Mr. Big: Bert I. Gordon Month"
This month we pay tribute to director Bert I. Gordon, who passed away this past March at age 100

As always, there may be spoilers here. And the trailer may be NSFW and/or NSFL.

Week 1: Earth vs. The Spider (1958)
Directed by Bert I. Gordon

My Impressions Going In:

I knew nothing

Plot:

A small town battles a giant mutant spider

Reaction and Other Folderol:

There's something really satisfying about these simple-storied 1950's mutant animal movies. They promise a nice fun romp that you don't have to think too hard to enjoy.  And the better ones, such as this, really deliver.

That's not to say there aren't flaws; there are plenty. For starters, what's with the 40-something year-old high school students? As a consumer of mass entertainment, I've gotten used to shows and movies with high school students being portrayed by actors who are too old for the part. But this takes it to a new level. There's that one guy who looks like he's in his forties. The movie was inconsistent about the spider's size, and the effects were the kind of cheesy you'd expect from a low budget movie of its era. Oh, yeah -- and it really bugged me when the scientist kept referring to the spider as an insect. But I guess that's me.

The script alluded to some kind of complex backstory about Mr. Flynn, the spider's first victim. We are led to believe that he is less than reliable -- maybe he drinks, maybe he cheats on his wife. That's hinted at just enough to whet the appetite, but there's never really a payoff. And I found that kind of annoying.

In the end, Eath vs. Spider is much more enjoyable than it is good. It is a perfect exemplar of its genre, and a really fun movie to watch (assuming you don't have arachnophobia. And that's worth a lot.

Ratings

Me: 8.5

Bob-O: 9

Christina: 8.9

Dave: 9.5

Ethan: 8

Joe: 10

cinema history class: where east is east (1929)

The session: "Happy 140th Birthday, Lon Chaney, Sr."
This month we watch silent movies starring the one and only Lon Chaney, Sr.

As always, there may be spoilers here. And the trailer may be NSFW and/or NSFL.

Week 4: Where East Is East (1929)
Directed by Tod Browning

My Impressions Going In:

I had heard of this, but knew nothing about it.

Plot:

A professional trapper (and all around adventureman) is happy for his daughter when she gets engaged. But things get complicated.

Reaction and Other Folderol:

The big story of this movie is that Lupe Velez manages to steal the scenes from Lon Chaney. I've noted in the past that Chaney was so great he would steal whatever scenes he was in in other movies. But here, the fabulous Lupe Velez outshines the master.

There's great chemistry between Chaney (as Tiger Haynes) and Velez (as his daughter, Toyo Haynes); they play well together and off each other. Perhaps, however, too well. In many of the scenes they're in together, they (as father and daughter) seem a little too flirty. Almost incesty. And that's in the context of a plot wherein Toyo's mom (Madame de Sylva, played by Estelle Taylor) is trying to seduce Toyo's fiance. Ick. And I don't mean to say "ick" in the sense of of calling this a bad movie. I do mean that it's kcreepy in a way I don't expect from a 1920s film. But it's really good. 

The movie never does explain why de Sylva is so bitter, why she's going after her daughter's fiance. But I suppose it doesn't matter. But, other than that question, it does manage to tie things up nicely. And, of course, you can't go wrong with a gorilla ending.

Ratings

Me: 9.7

Bob-O: 10

Christina: 8.1

Ethan: 10

Joe: 10

happy tunesday! write a song about me (the marc whinston project)

Continuing with the tracks from my album, Track number three is "Write a Song About Me."

For reference, previous entries in this series were:

• about the album as a whole;
• about track 1;
• about track 2;

In 2012 we were taking a family road trip to California. We stopped at GameStop in Nebraska to buy the kids some more entertainment. The place was staffed by some college kids who seemed kind of bored. As we waited in line to pay, I couldn't help but overhear some of their conversation. One of them complained that he didn't know what to write about for his English paper. "Write about me," replied the young lady who was working with him (and who seemed to be attracted to him), "I like when people write about me." And an idea was born.

The song itself has kind of an odd structure. There's no bridge, and it's V-C-V-C. And the two choruses aren't even the same. I'm not 100% sure why I wrote it that way. It was at least partly due to the fact that I wrote two different choruses, and I liked them both enough that I didn't want to discard either one.

When I wrote this, I was imagining it as being sung by a woman. I think it's the only song I ever wrote with a woman's voice in my mind. Toby, with his array of contacts, had no problem finding a suitable female vocalist. But when he sent me an mp3 with his vocal (which would serve as a guide for the hired female vocalist), I started to have second thoughts about whether it needed a female vocal. But I decided to stick with my vision and go for the female vocal. But then, when I heard Bryony's version I had another idea. I asked Toby if we could experiment and create a duet, seeing as we had a version with his vocal and one with Bryony's. All I had to do was decide which parts would be sung by the man, which by the woman, and which by both. It worked way better than I had hoped.

When I was first sequencing the album, I put this track first because it's one of my favorites and because it's probably the most upbeat song on the disc. But a Eytan Mirsky suggested I move it so as not to open with a duet. Don't use all your powder right away. That made sense, so I moved it to the third spot.

I also included the female-only and male-only versions of the song as bonus (never-before released!) tracks at the end of the album. There were many personal jokes that I was tempted to throw into the project -- fake names in the "special thanks" section...stuff like that. But I decided to treat this project seriously, and so left out all the jokes. Well, almost all the jokes. I did include the four "bonus" tracks at the end, packaging everything to look as if this was a rerelease of an earlier album. Just a small joke. I couldn't resist. Three of those tracks are alternate versions of tracks on the album.

Enjoy.

"Write a Song About Me"
Song by: Marc Whinston
Lead vocal by Toby Wilson and Bryony Ward
All instruments and backing vocals by Toby Wilson
Arranged and Produced by Toby Wilson for Tobias Wilson Music, Ltd.

cinema history class: west of zanzibar (1928)

The session: "Happy 140th Birthday, Lon Chaney, Sr."

This month we watch silent movies starring the one and only Lon Chaney, Sr.

As always, there may be spoilers here. And the trailer may be NSFW and/or NSFL.

Week 3: West of Zanzibar (1928)
Directed by Tod Browning

My Impressions Going In:

I had heard of this, and had seen the 1932 movie, Kongo, based on the same play. In fact, I saw it at Keith's.

Plot:

Phroso, the magician (Lon Chaney) gets crippled in a fight. So he builds a life for himself in the African jungle, where he can dream of revenge.

Reaction and Other Folderol:

For information, we saw the 1932 film,  Kongo (which is a remake of this), in class about 2½ years ago. I wrote about that here.

Going in, I was expecting to like this better than Kongo. Admittedly, that's a tall order -- I gave Kongo a 10. But this starred Lon Chaney who was arguably the best actor in cinema history. And we were going to watch him playing a paraplegic two weeks after we saw his amazing performance as a double amputee. Surely this would be a walk in the park for him. Since I will compare the performances, I am including a clip of Walter Huston in Kongo:

Comparing the two performances is tough, as they are both so strong.  Chaney was better at playing the paraplegic. The way he let his legs act dead was completely convincing. I was particularly taken with the way he would use his arms to pick up his legs and cross them. Huston was good, but not as good. There were a couple moments where it appears that he is putting weight on a leg. On the other had, I think Huston's overall look was more appropriate for the role. The scraggly hair and beard, and the big scar across the nose just work well. I won't say that Chaney looks wrong for the part -- just that he's not as good. And that brings us to the voice. Huston, in the role of Flint, has the perfect voice. It's exactly what I'd expect from that grizzled and bitter old man. Of course, we don't get to hear Chaney's voice because West of Zanzibar was a silent film,* so you can't really compare. Of course, that's not really Chaney's fault. And it's not even a flaw in the film. Still, the voice aspect of Kong does give it an edge.

West of Zanzibar does have a fuller backstory, which makes Chaney's version of Flint a more sympathetic villain. That's consistent with what I've seen in the several Lon Chaney films that I've seen recently (including the ones in Keith's class. It's kind of interesting -- Chaney plays a venal, hateful character with a backstory that makes him understandable and almost likable.

I also liked the ending to West better, as it's darker and more haunting.

Ultimately, West was a great movie. And there were ways that it was better than Kongo. But all things considered it wasn't quite as good.

Ratings

Me: 9.5

Bob-O: 10

Dave: 9.6

Ethan: 10

Joe: 10

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*In fact, Chaney only did one talkie in his career -- 1930's The Unholy Three, which was a remake of the 1925 silent film of the same name (which also starred Chaney).

happy tunesday! un-grand canyon (the marc whinston project)

 

Continuing with the tracks from my album, Track number two is "Un-Grand Canyon," written by Christina Zuber Crocker and me.

For reference, I wrote about the album as a whole here and about track 1 here.

"Un-Grand Canyon" is unique among the songs on the album in two different, but related, ways. The first is that it represents the first time that I wrote a melody for someone else's lyrics. Back when I was in high school, and starting to write songs, I was really only writing lyrics. On the few occasions that a melody got attached to my lyrics, it was because I brought them to a friend and asked for a melody. So, as a personal matter, there was pride in finding myself on the other side. The other is that it's the only song on the album which wasn't really my concept. While I, as the composer of the melody, share the songwriting credit, the fact is that this is Christina's baby. The other songs that include co-writers were my babies. I had the ideas and wrote them mostly by myself. My co-authors contributed words or music, and are therefore credited. But, again, this track is really Christina's song. My only contribution to the lyrics was as an editor. As I discuss below, Christina wrote a poem, and I did some editing to try to shoehorn her words into a song-like format. I note that this is the only track on which the credits list my co-author first -- again, because this one is really my-co-author's conception.

So how did it all come about? Early on in the process of  assembling recordings for the album, Christina asked me if I'd be interested in setting any of her poems to music. I said I'd try, but made no promises. Christina shared two lyrics with me, this being one of them. Christina's poems are very different than my songs, which in and of itself increases the variety on the album. "Un-Grand Canyon" is kind of an elegy for New York City, Christina's observations on a city which may have passed its peak. The other lyric she gave me, which I did not work with yet*, is about riding the subway. It's not quite as negative, but there's still a bit of a jaded tone to it.

Christina's lyrics are dense with clever cultural references:

Midnight Cowboy's been fired.
Tiffany's breakfast seems tired.
Woody's been shamed.
Hamilton's no Mame.

This is stuff I could not not have written -- I wish I could have, but that's just not a style that I can do. But I could edit it. Above, I mentioned that Christina gave me poems. I wanted to edit this down into a song without changing the tone -- and I think I succeeded if I do say so myself. Of course, maybe I didn't do as good a job as I think; if you write out the lyrics, you'll see that the scansion is wildly inconsistent. The fact that this worked as well as it did -- and I have heard from a few people that this is the best track on the record** -- is a testament to the skills of Toby Wilson (who arranged and played on the track) and Eytan Mirsky (who generously provided the lead vocal). FWIW, you can hear (and purchase) Eytan's music from (among other places) Bandcamp.

I was still working on this late last summer when most (all? I'm not sure) of the rest of the album had been recorded. Christina and I liked the arrangement that Toby came up with (actually, the second or third, but who's counting), but didn't think his vocal did the song justice. We wanted a singer who sounded like a New Yorker and who could capture the world-weariness necessary for this song. Eytan Mirsky*** agreed to give it a go, and the result was pure magic. As I noted above, this must have been a real challenge because of the odd scansion. I was a bit nervous about how it would come out, but I am really pleased with the results.

"Un-Grand Canyon"
Song by: Christina Zuber Crocker and Marc Whinston

Lead vocal by Eytan Mirsky

All instruments and backing vocals by Toby Wilson

Arranged and Produced by Toby Wilson for Tobias Wilson Music, Ltd.

_________________________________________________

*maybe next album?

** I don't think it is (sorry, Christina), but I'm biased.
***A little bit of background is in order. Eytan is a New York-based singer-songwriter who has achieved some measure of success writing songs for several indie films such as Happiness, American Splendor, and The Tao of Steve. I've been something of a fan since I first heard his music in the 1990's -- I just love "I Just Wanna Be Your Steve McQueen." I ran into him on the subway about 2½ years ago. My son, Ethan, was embarrassed when we were waiting for a train and I suddenly approached what looked like a random stranger and said "Excuse me sir, are you Eytan Mirsky?" I think Eytan got a kick out of being recognized. We've been friends since.

cinema history class: the monster (1925)

The session: "Happy 140th Birthday, Lon Chaney, Sr."

This month we watch silent movies starring the one and only Lon Chaney, Sr.

As always, there may be spoilers here. And the trailer may be NSFW and/or NSFL.

Week 3: The Monster (1925)
Directed by Roland West

My Impressions Going In:

Never heard of it

Plot:

A nebishy would-be detective is investigating strange disappearances near an insane asylum

Reaction and Other Folderol:

This is a Lon Chaney month. In theory, each of these movies should feature Chaney as the star. In a sense, then, this is kind of the odd man out. Chaney is prominent, but he's not really the star. The main character is the amateur detective, played as a bowling pin-like guy by the forgettable (and, I suppose, forgotten) Johnny Arthur. And yet, such is the greatness of Lon Chaney that he manages to take over every scene he's in. By dint of charisma, he seizes stardom. Which shouldn't surprise. He actually got top billing despite being not the star.

In some ways, it's easy now, a century after this was made, to dismiss this as a lot of stuff I've seen in other movies. But it's important to remember that The Monster was setting the template. Was this the first movie to feature soul transference? Was Chaney's portrayal of Ziska the blueprint for the mad doctor? When I watched the Star Trek episode, "Whom Gods Destroy," was I viewing a direct descendant of this movie? And were the Three Stooges influenced by the slapstick comedy in this movie?

Again, it's hard to give a rating to a movie that's so different from what I'm used to, but I tried...

Ratings

Me: 9

Christina: 9.1

Dave: 9.5

Ethan: 8.5

happy tunesday! music no one else can hear (the marc whinston project)

 

As threatened, I am devoting a series of Tunesday posts to the songs on my album. Today is the first track, the title track, "Music No One Else Can Hear." If you don't want to hear lots of detail about how the song came to be, feel free to listen to it anyway.

The song has its roots back when I was in high school. At the time I was writing a lot of songs.* They all pretty much sucked. Most of them are long-forgotten, though I remember some titles and some passages. I have no memory of the actual song I wrote back then -- or even if I wrote one or not. But I remember the inspiration. I was hanging out at Tony's**. Actually, I was sitting on the roof of the car parked outside of Tony's. A friend, Melinda, borrowed my walkman.*** She started listening. And then she started dancing. After maybe a minute of that, she gave it back. With a slightly self-conscious laugh she said something about how she'd better stop because she's dancing to music no one else can hear. I don't remember the exact words, but that final phrase struck me as a great song title. And that's how most of my songs began back then -- with a phrase that I thought was catchy. Come to think of it, that's still how I do it a lot of the time. As I noted above, I really don't recall whether I wrote a song to the title back then.

The first version I remember anything about dates back to my grad school days. And it happens to be a pretty direct ancestor of the current song. As my first year at the University of Michigan approached its end, I started dating someone named Anne. But I went home to New York for the summer, while she spent her summer in Detroit. And, while we were apart, I wrote her a song.

I'm not entirely sure how it came together -- whether I decided to write her a song, or whether it came to me. Sitting with my guitar, I started writing to the tune of Air Supply's "All Out of Love." Air Supply's song begins:

I'm lying alone
With my head on the phone
Thinking of you 'til it hurts.
I know you hurt too
But what else can we do,
Tormented and torn apart?

I wrote:

I'm lying in bed
With you in my head
Wondering where you are now.
Tell me, can it be?
Are you thinking of me,
Even though I'm not around?

And that was my first verse. I continued with a chorus, At this point I kind of made up a melody as I went along. If I recall correctly, this was the first time I attempted writing my own melody.

Your song is with me, wherever I am,
Even when you're not here.
And all around me there's music,
Music No One Else Can Hear.

I wrote more, but I don't remember any of it. I played the song for Anne when we saw each other again at the end of the summer. I remember sitting on my bed, with my guitar, my leg shaking with nerves because I had never before played a song I wrote -- much less for the girl I had written it for. I don't know -- I'll never know -- if Anne liked the song, but she appreciated the effort.

There have, over the years, been many iterations of the song. One of them even ended up on an album by The Milner Brothers  - a result of my playing it for Scott Milner on a camping trip. The current version is in the video above. The first verse is, almost word for word, the first verse and chorus that I sang for Anne almost 35 years ago.

And it's the title track of the album for no better reason than the fact that I think it's a great title for an album.

"Music No One Else Can Hear"
Song by: Marc Whinston
Lead vocal by Toby Wilson
All instruments and backing vocals by Toby Wilson
Arranged and Produced by Toby Wilson for Tobias Wilson Music, Ltd.

________________________________________

*More accurately, I was writing lyrics. I still didn't feel that I could set anything to music.

**Tony's Luncheonette, a small hangout spot next door to the school.

***Unimportant detail: in the walkman was a copy of the Dave Edmunds album, D.E.7th

music no one else can hear: the album

It's out. It's finally out.

Several social media friends have asked questions about my new album, Music No One Else Can Hear. Rather than answer everyone individually, I've decided to cop out and write this as a blog post.

Before I go into the background and describe what this album is, let me say what it isn't. This is not an album of me singing or performing. I am not a good guitarist, and as a singer? Well, as a singer I make a good guitarist. On 17 tracks, only one includes my performing in any way; I play guitar on one track, and that's labelled as a "bedroom demo." That's why this is not branded as a "Marc Whinston" album. Rather, it's by "The Marc Whinston Project."

So having said that, I turn back to the question of what this album is. It's a showcase of my songs -- songs that I wrote (or, in four cases, co-wrote).

Anyone who knows me well knows that I write songs. It's a hobby. I've done it for a long time.* I get kind of frustrated because I'm not a good musician or singer, but I have written a few good tunes (if I do say so myself -- and I do) which I want to put out there into the world. Not that I expect to gain fame or fortune through my songs. I'm too realistic for that. But still, I just want to share my artistic endeavors.

A few years ago I had the idea of recording an album. My original idea was to take my songs into the studio and, with hired musicians, record. Maybe I'd play some guitar on it. That didn't really work out well -- primarily because I don't sing well. The next idea was to see if I could recruit bands or musicians to record my songs for an album which I would put out. I know a few musicians. And they know other musicians. Going through the list in my head, I concluded that I could probably recruit enough of them to record for me. I loved the idea of curating an album of various musicians and bands recording versions of my songs. I fantasized about titling it "Songs in the Key of Moish**" and branding it as a tribute album to me. Somehow*** the idea morphed from a various artists type of presentation to a more coherent consistent sound.

I ended up working with Toby Wilson, a freelance musician and producer in England who seemed to have a good feel for what I was getting at. In the end, he recorded almost the whole album. For a variety of reasons, a few tracks have other vocalists -- Bryony Ward, Helen Walford and Tim Patterson (all of whom Toby found) and Eytan Mirsky (a New York based singer-songwriter I know, who graciously agreed to lend his vocals to two tracks). And an old friend from grad school, Joseph Discenza, makes a brief appearance doing a voiceover. And there's one rough track, the aforementioned "bedroom demo" that I recorded with a friend in his apartment in San Francisco over ten years ago.

It took a little more than two years from when I first contacted Toby until the album's official release yesterday -- April 1, 2023. Appropriately, I picked April Fools Day. The main reason it took so long is that I didn't want to just send Toby a lot of songs with instructions to record them. I started with one. Liking what he did with it, I sent him another. In order to make it last -- to savor the process -- I disciplined myself. One track a month. On the fifteenth I would send him a lyric sheet and a link to an unlisted Youtube video of me singing a song and playing it on guitar. 

Pacing it out like that proved to be a good thing in many ways. When I started, I had a bunch of completed songs. But I found that I was still writing. So, if I had hurried it and just sent him a bunch of songs all at once, then some of the songs that are on the album would not have come about. Without naming specifics, that includes two of my favorites.

In the coming weeks I plan to write a series of posts about the songs on the album. My plan is to post them on Tuesdays as part of my semi-regular "Tunesday" series. I will go into more detail there, but I want to thank my co-writers here: Christina Zuber Crocker, Keith J. Crocker, Eric Goulden (AKA, Wreckless Eric), Scott C. Milner and Amy Rigby.

You can listen to these recordings on Spotify, Pandora, Youtube and other streaming services. Just search for "The Marc Whinston Project." I hope you enjoy and add these songs to your playlists. 

_____________________________________________

*It's tempting to try talking about how long, but that discussion would be too long and too tangential. So, for now, I won't go into it.

**Moish being a nickname of mine. Some of my oldest friends still call me "Moish."

*** I write that as if I have no idea how it morphed. I actually know very well how and why. But that story is tangential for this post.