The Russo Brothers were holding a film festival, and I had a free Friday night, so I made a video about the secret life of a houseplant. There were 700 or so entries (you can watch some on their Twitter account). This probably ranked #699 (#700 was probably somebody uploading the wrong video), but it makes me laugh. Maybe it will make you laugh also.
For more fun, read Edna's Employment Agency!
Another one of the songs on the first Yeast? gets rerecorded here. I like the pipe organ sound on my vintage Yamaha keyboard, so I used that here. I have told the story behind the song before, so I won't recap it here. It's a fun song to play, maybe more fun than a song about male anal rape in prison should be. I had to buy a pair of wireless gaming headphones for a gig I had (they overcharged for them, which was typical of that crazy place), and they have become useful during recording, which makes me less bitter about the employer price-gouging (on a sidenote, if your employer tries to offload the cost of your work materials on you, just try to find another job). I kind of like the microphone sound on them as well, but I didn't use that mic here. The drums get overloaded at times here, but I like the sound of them. This is more tuneful than a lot of my songs. It's fun to hum and whistle.
To hear the original version of "Big Daddy Pane", get the Dick Bennett ep.
Rather than just follow the lyrics with images (though you can find that here as well, albeit more disjointed than usual), I turned the video into a silent film/story. It can be read at the surface level as a tale of teen angst, much like the song, or as a satire of such, unlike the song. I don't smoke, but, fortunately, my buddy John was nice enough to let me film his cigarettes. The cheap camcorder I usually use for the videos is on the fritz, so this video is more lo-fi and freaky than usual. I guess I'll keep using it until it breaks completely, but it could make for some strange videos coming up. I always find it amusing what YouTube picks for the thumbnail pictures, and this time it looks like my Lamb's Ear made the cut (they are really soft--strange to have a furry plant).
For more fun, read Edna's Employment Agency!
This is another of the songs on the first Yeast? 7". It's about a bored teenager who is thinking about killing herself one minute and then what color she should paint her nails the next (really, it should be a woman singing it, but you get stuck with me). Being only two chords, it's a lot of fun to play. For this version, I jammed out a little bit at the end, so if you want the garage rock version, then stop listening in the middle when the singing stops. I recorded an even longer version, but it started heading into Led Zeppelin The Song Remains The Same territory, and I had to pull the plug on that. This version is a nice compromise between the short, tight version that ends when the lyrics do, and the crazy jamout the song can become. I Vince Neiled it and doubletracked the vocals (apparently, the Motley Crue recordings were actually collages of dozens of takes, taking the best from each; fortunately, I didn't get that crazy). For the weird instrument, I was going to use a tin whistle, but it didn't sound good, so I utilized it as a percussion instrument instead (it's that trebly metal sound); I don't recommend that as the whistle is now considerably bent, but it did make for a nice percussion sound.
To hear the original version of "Generic Smokes", get the Dick Bennett ep.
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