I’m starting a new job on Monday. It’s a contract job, and it might only last until Thanksgiving, but I’m hoping for something longer. It’s a good job and I’m excited about it. Satisfying assignments! Interesting co-workers! Payday!
It’s been an unsettled time, filled with networking, interviews, freelancing, conferences, more networking, and too much time on LinkedIn. Do I wish I had written more during these months? Of course I do. But I wrote what I wrote and page by page I’m going to get where I want to go.
We celebrated my new status by eating too much pizza. We’re going to walk it off tomorrow while hiking around Mt. Hood. Mountain ridges, views of distant peaks, alpine meadows, mountain flowers. And in two weeks, payday!
One more day in the Write-a-thon is in the books. Literally.
Random Pick of the Day 1.0
David Byrne, The Catherine Wheel (1981)
Most of David Byrne’s solo work leaves me cold, but what I like I like a lot, and that includes about half the 23 songs on this disc. The lyrics are subpar by Byrne standards, but the music often rises above – way above. I was an idiot for not appreciating this album 30 years ago.
Random Pick of the Day 2.0
Bobby Fuller Four, I Fought the Law (1966)
Bobby Fuller (who died at 23) was a talented man who loved the music of Buddy Holly (who died at 22). This record is a vision of what Holly might’ve sounded like if he’d lived, except I have the feeling that if Holly had lived past 1959, he would’ve changed a heckuva lot by 1966.
Fuller’s work is particularly interesting in that it was recorded against the tidal wave of the British Invasion and on the cusp of psychedelia. Fuller is known today solely for his version of “I Fought the Law,” but frankly I think everyone else does it better. I prefer his originals, especially “King of the Beach,” “Baby My Heart,” and “Nervous Breakdown.” They were released on other albums or as singles, but later releases of the BF4 are usually called I Fought the Law and sometimes include them. Bobby Fuller’s catalog has been messed up by decades of nostalgia but is worth exploring.
Run-DMSteve 
Yes, David Byrne was stepping out back then, creating the Catherine Wheel for Twyla Tharp’s dance company. Have you also revisited My Life In The Bush Of Ghosts, early electronica with Brian Eno, or, Music For “The Knee Plays,” an opera soundtrack? All of these different “theatre” pieces were done in the 80’s, I believe.
Oh, and ya, con grates on the new job, ex-slacker.
And continued productive writing in your final weeks of that Clarion thing, and beyond.
I like only a few of Byrne’s songs from these experiments; their titles don’t come to mind at the moment. This is why Catherine Wheel is huge for me, because I like so much of it.
Thank you. I’m going to go enjoy the absence of slackness!
Good luck on the new job. They made a good decision to hire you.
Congrats on the job. I will keep my fingers crossed it goes past thanksgiving
Thank you!!